Worm Loops
by gbear605
Summary: This is not her first time here. Nor will it be her last. Innortal-style time loops in the Worm verse.
1. Chapter 1

Worm loops: Inspired by Innortal/Saphroneth Infinite Loops. Unstable and possibly multi-timeline. Pick what canon you want.

All loops written here are not written by me unless otherwise noted. Loops found here can also be found on the SpaceBattles forum.

Loop mechanics (general):

One person in a Loop, often the main character, is an Anchor. They are the person who first starts time looping.

There is always at least one Anchor present in a given Time Loop snippet, though it may not be the local one.

The standard pattern for a Loop is that the Anchor (and whoever else is Looping there) come to awareness in a loop at a particular point in the story. From there, events will play out as influenced by the Loopers present, acting with the benefit of their foreknowledge, until either a predetermined end point is reached or all the Loopers have copped it.

To be Awake is to be aware of the Time Loops (that is, to have gone back in time this time.)

The Anchor is the only character guaranteed to be Awake. Even after others have started Looping, it is mostly random as to whether they will be Awake this particular Loop.

Crossovers, fusions, and alternate pasts can also take place. It is perfectly possible, for example, to have the characters Awaken into a Loop which conforms to a fanfic universe rather than reality.

Loops do not have to be in chronological order, but it is strongly preferred that they not require a mutually contradictory order (where A must be before B and B must be before A.)

Just about every Looper is very, very stir crazy.

The Time Loops happen because bugs happened with the Yggdrasil tree that administrates all of the Multiverse.

Some loops here use the storyline that the Worm universe was the 'Junk Space' for bugs, errors, and etc. from the rest of the Yggdrasil. Taylor is the administrator of the timeline because of her shard, but doesn't know how to use her powers, until taught by other administrators of the Yggdrasil. The Entities are viruses from the Yggdrasil.

A lot of this is explained in character in loop 1.13

Consolidated by gbear605

Thread on SpaceBattles started by Taron.

Worm written by the amazing Wildbow

* * *

1.1 (Taron)

"You really saved us a lot of trouble." I heard Brian's voice muffled from behind the helmet he wore as part of his costume. I looked over the team I had belonged to what I could only describe of as a future that hadn't happened yet. I briefly entertained the notion that what had happened was delusion I had had in the locker before swiftly discarding the notion; Lung had been here hadn't he?

Brian; or Grue had his hand held out. I decided to shake it this time.

"When we got word Lung was aiming to come after us tonight, we were pretty freaked. We were arguing strategy for the better part of the day. We eventually decided, fuck it, we'd meet him halfway. Wing it. Not my usual way of doing things, but yeah."

The meeting seemed to go exactly as I forsaw it.

"Lung is getting creamed. The fuck you do to him?" Said Brian as he looked over the edge of the building at a writhing Lung.

"Pepper spray, wasp and bee stings, fire ants and spider bites," Spoke Lisa for the first time.

And then something I don't remember happening happened. "So; you a precog on top of Bug Powers then?"

"I-"

* * *

1.2 (nocarename)

Last thing I remembered, I'd been shot in the head by a sniper. No doubt by 'mistake'. Ha. That'll teach me to try making waves before I have a bullet proof suit together. Still, it beat the times Simurg had decided to visit Brockton instead of Canberra.

Instead of a normal reset though I woke up and I stretched my back.

I was in a small rental apartment, it was a new morning and I was supposed to be getting ready for school. Choosing clothes was easy since there was a uniform. The colors weren't ideal - purple, green and yellow didn't really work for me or anyone else honestly. All the different after school clubs were crazy, the student population was huge, and the history here didn't make any sense at all.

Still, there were compensations.

No powers, no parahumans - give or take some mad scientists who might have counted as tinkers.

Eiken was annoying, yes, but there were no damn Endbringers, no Scion and I had cleavage.

One thing I've learned over the years: Take your wins where you can.

* * *

1.3 (Ridiculously Average Guy)

It was Sunday night and Dennis was nursing a mug of coffee, staring at the book on his table like it was going to knife him.

He had no doubt that if somebody (probably his father) walked in they'd think he was cracking up, but after the hell that book had made of his past two weeks he didn't really want to take any chances. After all, the thing was single-handedly responsible for the biggest security craze in the Protectorate since before he'd joined.

Too make things worse, it looked so innocent compared to what he had expected.

Granted, he might have demonized it a bit. But after a week of Master/Stranger protocols, then another week of constant testing and training exercises, Dennis had kind of expected an Endbringer in literary form. He was pretty sure he had heard somewhere it was whispering elderitch secrets at people whenever they got close- or, wait, wasn't he the one that spread the rumor?

Dennis sighed and leaned in his chair, rubbing his temples.

four or five nights of interrupted sleep do odd things to a man.

Regardless, after the second or third night he had begun to think of the book as the devil. Instead, what he got was a hardcover barely bigger than the safety handouts the PR department kept trying to get him to push.

He'd really expected something more...menacing, which was pretty ironic considering he was one of the first people to see it. Him and the rest of the Wards.

They'd all thought it was a prank when they'd each woken up that Monday by application of book to head. At 5 AM.

It wasn't until they corroborated stories, and realized none of them was the culprit, that things began to get serious. And that is when master/stranger protocols were initiated.

Somebody knew their civilian identities, somebody knew where they lived, somebody from outside the protectorate. Things seemed even worse when it turned out it wasn't just the wards, the entire protectorate had woken up with a copy of the a while everything was panic.

Things only began to calm down when the delivery method was figured out. It looked like a new cape had appeared in the city, some type of bug master. Somehow the master had figured out where everyone of them lived then dropped off the book in a cloud of flies and spiders, which might explain why the book itself was so light.

They probably would have spent another week in lock-up, narrowing down how things happened, if it wasn't for Armsmaster. Who's apparently recording himself in his sleep.

The wierdo.

It was only once the PRT had things figured out, and safety measures in place, that they actually took a look at the book.

Which lead to the last week. A hell of constant testing, of simulations, and of team training. More often than not with Shadow Stalker, of all people.

The worst part was how much it worked. He could honestly say he had learned to do more with his power in the past week then he had in the past year.

All because of this stupid book with a bug in a lab coat on the cover.

He didn't really want to read it. He was exhausted, and most of the blame for that rested on it's pages. Also, considering how much of the last day was just practice, he figured they'd covered everything in the book they'd needed to.

Buuut, Armsmaster wanted the Wards to read it. More accurately, he'd ordered them to memorize it by Monday before the copies would be gathered for destruction, the information therein considered to dangerous to let spread. Army apparently wanted them to "learn how to think like the author", and since he could apparently read Dennis' mind, they'd be tested on it to check if they half-assed it.

Sometimes- no wait, pretty much all the time, he hated that man.

He figured he'd dallied, *snort* dallied, long enough. Time to actually read this thing.

"Why you suck at using your powers, and how to fix that", Brockton Bay Edition

by {insert ascii stick figure here}

He smiled a little bitterly, the title didn't sound quite so snarky anymore.

* * *

1.4 (Peanuckle)

"Taylor, how can you just sit there! There's a gang-war going on!"

"I know, the gunfire is so relaxing, isn't it? Like cicadas chirping at night."

"Taylor, quick! The bank was robbed, we have to catch the crooks before they get away!"

"How many people were hurt?"

"Nobody, thankfully"

"Okay, I'm going back to bed. Wake me up when the city's on fire."

"Goddammit, Taylor."

* * *

1.5 (nocarename)

I saw the kid walk into The Place. Well, I say kid but between her height and her eyes she could have placed anywhere between fourteen and forty-five. Hair like a dark cloud of curls and not a lot of anything to her. If you couldn't see her face you might have thought she'd blow away in the breeze.

"I'm Jake Stonebender. Welcome to The Place," I said once she'd picked out a stool, "What'll it be?"

She blinked, like someone seeing light after coming out a long dark tunnel.

"What would you say if I said I was trapped in a time loop, reliving some of the worst years of my life and occasionally thrown into different and strange universes taking the places of other people who should have been there instead?" she asked with a soft voice.

It probably says something about my circle of friends that I am able to name a dozen people who would nod and accept this. It probably said more about them that we'd stayed friends for years, especially after the time we'd set a nuke off at Callahan's Place that one night. (It had stopped the alien invasion and no one got anything worse than a sunburn. Callahan's had been a special place, but we carried on the spirit as best as we could through the years.)

"First, I'd say that calls for an Irish Coffee. Second, I'd ask if there was anything I, or my friends, could do to help out. Is there?"

I pressed the button to start The Machine with a whir and a thump. She blinked at me again.

"Just like that?"

"Just like that," I confirmed, "Around here, we raise hopes and build dreams. That and we have some experience with time travel and second chances. It's kind of a thing."

"My name's Taylor, Taylor Hebert and once upon a time, I wanted to be a hero."

* * *

1.6 (Slayer Anderson)

When I was young...and that seems so long ago now...

When I was young, and I had problems, I went to my parents. I went to the teachers. I went to the principal. I went to the occasional police officer. When I was young, I believed in authority. I believed in the idea that there were people who had the skill, ability, and obligation, neigh, desire to help individuals with problems. Of course, there comes a time in every persons life when that illusion of authority is shattered, when they come upon a problem that they alone can solve, for any number of reasons.

For me? That problem occurred when I was fourteen, and my best friend betrayed me.

No one would help.

No one would listen.

No one would grow a fucking spine and stand up to three teenage girls.

And then I triggered. I got powers. I was powerful. I could change my life. I could help people, people like me, people who didn't have anyone they could turn to. It didn't matter that my power wasn't amazing like some. It didn't matter that I wasn't strong, wasn't fast, wasn't anything a normal human would call 'impressive.'

When I was fifteen, I woke up in the hospital with the power to control bugs.

That was today.

That was a decade ago.

That was a century ago.

I sighed and opened my eyes, the familiar feeling of coarse cotton sheets, the background rumble of hallway traffic a welcome balm to the uncomfortable silence of Brockton Bay Community Hospital at night. Of course, I had just been admitted a few hours ago, so I shouldn't have any idea what this place was like at night.

But I did.

"...and now the medicine tray," I whispered.

There was a clatter, some laughter, then a barking voice of a doctor ordering the mess cleaned up. I sighed again, rubbing at my eyes.

"Note to self, cockroach armor is not sufficient protection for Behemoth's kill aura and Panacea can't heal you if you die of radiation poisoning." I dictated to the air around me, staring at nothing even as my mind opened to the swarms of insects hiding between the walls, in the ceilings and floors, under the beds, and everywhere else besides. I never trusted anyone that believed hospitals were clean, especially since I got my powers.

Reaching out, I pushed my range to it's limits, feeling the millions upon millions of insects, arachnids, crustaceans, and annelids in the blocks around me. My mind exploded with sensory data...tactile coming first, then smell, then taste, then hearing...and finally sight.

"Well, that's one good thing about this mess," I mumbled to myself, "I thought I was imagining it the first few times, but my range is definitely increasing. I've got...five miles? Just about that, now."

I pinpointed a few colonies of black widows guiding them to safe havens to begin weaving my costume.

Again.

"Again, again, again," I grumbled. What had it been now? Fifty times? At least that.

At first, I had thought it was a parahuman, maybe someone with a power like Grey Boy's, on steroids. That was, of course, after I'd figured out it wasn't a dream, or a delusion, or even some new power that caused people to experience illusions. I had thought this was maybe even Contessa's idea of Hell.

Or God's.

I hadn't ever considered the notion of an omniscient deity with any seriousness since I was became a teenager, even after learning what what Scion was, even after killing him. Even with everything I'd gone through...maybe because of everything I'd gone through, the idea of 'God' wasn't exactly an appealing notion.

Or maybe this was Scion's idea of Hell? Maybe he had condemned me to some kind of eternal punishment for killing him. But, then, if it was Scion...he had beaten me...more times even than I'd killed him. If he had won...then what was the point in continuing?

But...eventually, I'd made a mistake.

One of Grey Boy's clones had gotten me.

Reality had...well, I'd compare it to feeling that grinding noise machinery makes when something is broken-there'd been a terrible shriek of noise that wasn't noise and...

I'd woken up, back in the hospital.

Just like every time.

Every time I died, every time the world ended, every time I saved it, every single fucking time...I woke back up in the hospital, the day of my trigger, fifteen years old. I had beaten the Endbringers in a dozen ways, I had stopped Cauldron at least as many times, I had killed the Slaughterhouse-fucking-Nine by myself. So many things I once would have thought impossible...

..and it hadn't helped.

I couldn't 'win.'

My heart clenched, fingernails drawing blood from my palms as my hands followed suit. Whatever was going one, it was big. Bigger than Cauldron. Bigger than the CUI or the Protectorate. Bigger than the Endbringers. Bigger than Scion. There was something wrong with the world and only I knew. I had tried, and tried, and tried to fix it, to be better, and it hadn't worked.

I couldn't win.

I remembered when I first thought that, so many years ago, when I'd first woken up from my hospitalization, when I'd learned that nobody was going to do anything, even after all the pain and torture I'd been put through. I remember the moment I'd realized no one would help, that I'd have to do everything on my own.

I couldn't win.

I'd joined the Undersiders, I'd joined the Wards, I'd gone independent, I'd made my own team. None of it had worked, none of it had gotten me any closer to my goal of figuring out my real problem, but all of those attempts had taught me valuable lessons, shown me the figures behind the thrones of power, let me in on all their skeletons. I knew things nations would kill for, secrets so terrible they would shake the foundations of reality itself...and that was just from my first 'life.' None of that mattered, though. Nothing but my knowledge, my skills, my powers, carried over. If I was a powerful cape, one that needed time to build up, to train physical abilities, that would have been a handicap. As it was, remaking my suit was headache enough. But no, none of it really mattered. Defeating the Endbringers didn't matter, defeating Scion didn't matter...so I had a little more than two years before the world ended...and it didn't matter.

I couldn't win?

"Fuck that," I spat, my resolve hardening.

I'd come too far to give up now. If everything I'd tried hadn't worked, I just try something else. I'd gotten a tinker rating more than once in my 'lives,' it was time to see how far I could push it. Maybe I'd even join Toybox...they had done some serious research into the complexities of time and space. If I couldn't 'win,' this stupid game my way, that was fine. I'd win, then I'd find whatever had caused this nightmare...and express my displeasure.

My musings were interrupted when my father, his face red with anger from talking with the principal outside my door. It was a conversation I'd memorized through sheer over-exposure. I met his gaze as his eyes softened and he moved to wrap his arms around me. I pulled a group of bugs from beneath my bed for my demonstration.

"Dad," I began, "We need to talk."

...

* * *

1.7 (Noliar)

Go to the Discworld they said. It will be fun and you can learn Deja Fu. Ha. Last time (for a while) I take advice from a Watcher. If there's one thing not on the curriculum at the Quirm College for Young Ladies it's esoteric martial arts. Hockey doesn't count. Pretty different from Winslow - the dominance games are far more gentle but also far more serious when you know that everyone in the class is going to be a VIP.

Thinking of which, time to do some more discreet studying up on the Duchy I'm Supposedly duchess of.

Some time later...

WHO ARE YOU AND WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH SUSAN?

* * *

1.8 (nocarename)

"What the hell Taylor. What the actual hell."

I looked up from my laptop where I'd been juggling accounts. There was a surprising amount of number crunching in taking over Coil's criminal enterprises once you'd blown up both his secret bunker and his quiet suburban house at the same time.

You know, hypothetically.

"Lisa! Glad you could make it."

"Seriously Taylor, just looking at you is giving my power fits. How is this even happening," and here her voice dropped into a harsh whisper, "and why do I remember you as part of the Wards and running around menacing all the gangs with butterflies?"

I'd done that, but not this time through. This time had been strictly criminal and untraceable. Full of cheating, but untraceable.

"How do you feel about second chances?"

I saw her pale as her power connected a few more dots.

"It's not that bad," I said, "Just, a little repetitive. Now come on, I'm trying to keep this funded long enough to shoot Jack Slash in the face with artillery."

* * *

1.9 (Nikas)

"Taylor."

"Yes Lisa?"

Lisa buzzed her wings. "I don't know how, but this is all your fault."

Taylor checked her own carapace. "That is hardly fair."

Lisa shouted back "We are big horse shaped bugs! You have to be the reason somehow!"

* * *

1.10 (Archanon)

It had been a long, long time that I'd been in these resets and every time I woke up at the beginning, right after I'd triggered. Honestly, usually I just ignored Emma, Sophia and Madison these days; they simply don't register anymore. To be honest, they didn't register anymore by the end of my first life, let alone my twentieth.

On the other hand, by this point I've come to accept that I can't change the fact that I'm stuck reliving my life, no matter what I manage to do. And knowing that, every now and then it's nice to blow off some steam.

I walked into Winslow High with a bright smile on my face, contrary to what anyone would expect of me at this point in time. I could feel the insects all around me, in the walls... including the extras I'd spent a few weeks inducing to nest. My three 'tormentors' spotted me and moved towards me; they couldn't abide me being happy, after all.

"What are you so happy about, Hebert?" Madison asked, as they surrounded me. Predictably, none of the students or teachers seemed to care.

"Did you finally get a new mommy?" Emma sneered. That was really not one of her best lines. Though granted, it might have worked if this had been my first life.

"No," I told her, not letting my smile slip an inch. "I got something better."

This made Emma frown, and Sophia quickly stepped up to take her turn. "Oh, please, Hebert. Everyone knows that you're a wimp because you miss your mommy. What could you possibly have found that's better?"

"Funny you should ask!" I said. I called on the swarm. It boiled out of the walls, causing the students to begin running and screaming. Sophia looked angry; Emma and Madison looked like they wanted to run. "The answer is BEES."

I raised my hands, and my bees descended. I began cackling, acting as if I'd gone and snapped completely. "BEES! BEES, BEES, BEES! YOU GET SOME BEES, YOU GET SOME BEES, EVERYBODY GETS BEES!"

Internally I was, well, cackling just about as much as I was on the outside. I could never quite predict what the outcome of me letting loose on the school would be, but it was usually interesting, and the looks on their faces were so worth it, even if doing this meant my choices would be limited for the rest of the loop.

I wonder if they'd send me to the Birdcage again? It didn't happen often but it wasn't completely unknown. Next time, I was planning on usurping Teacher and seeing where that went. Maybe I'd get to find out soon!

"BEEEEEEES!"

* * *

1.11 (Rex)

I awoke. Hmmm. I'm in a bathroom, and I appear to be soaked in juice. Meaning… April 8, 2011 approximately twelve o'clock. A quick check of native memories…

A standard loop as far as I can tell aside from the slightly odd starting point. I'm sure that'll be relevant at some point, but in the meantime, I can continue my initial plan for this loop. I'm fairly certain the dye packs hit Khonsu before I got hit by one of his fields, so I'll count the last loop as a success and move onto my final target. Which means spending two years sticking as close to the origin as possible. Ah well, not like it's that much of a time investment. Now let's see, after the bathroom I head home and finish up my costume right? Sounds close enough. And then I get to fight Lung again. It'll be good to see everyone again.

My route decided, I set my body on course for home and moved the majority of my consciousness into my swarm. One of the more wonderful aspects of my powers that I had developed as a result of the loops is the ability to send my body on auto pilot while I did other things with my swarm. It wasn't good enough for conversation or combat, but I didn't have to concern myself about walking home or following a patrol route. All the spider's in the city started to quietly converge on a convenient abandoned warehouse in the docks, a quiet war began to rage against the rat population, and a discrete number of bugs was detailed to clean up my clothing.

Three days later and I was entering the docks when someone moved in the alleyway on my right side. I jolted my full concentration back to my body and prepared my swarms for a fight much harder than the one I had been headed towards. There hadn't been anyone I could detect in the alleyway moments ago, and more importantly there hadn't been anyone there in earlier loops. I didn't think I did anything that could have changed responses this early in the loop, which means that this person had knowledge from a previous loop. Depending on who they were, this could be a very bad thing. I took a good look at them through my swarm as she started to walk towards where I was standing. I didn't recognize her. This was bad. Very bad. New people would completely wreck my plans.

"Calm down." The woman spoke. Her voice was light and soothing, almost unnaturally calm. "I'm sorry for startling you." Her voice had a strange undertone to it, almost like musical chimes. And then I figured it out. Long platinum blonde hair, spread out over both the front of her chest and flared behind her shoulders. Coupled with the grey bandanna covering her eyes and the airy, loosely fitted silver costume she was wearing, this could only be one person. Or rather one being that currently looked like a human for some reason.

"Simurgh." I breathed out in a whisper. This would definitely derail my plans. Would it be simpler just to get myself killed rather than deal with her manipulations? It's not like death would stay with me for very long, but if she could interfere with the loops and had some plan to corrupt me then it would be exceedingly important that I prevent her from succeeding.

"Please don't do anything impulsive Taylor, I don't have any terrible plan or anything like that. I simply remember the last loop and have no desire to be dyed neon pink. Apparently, this is the path that best avoids that route, and since the impulse was removed last time around, I seem to be free of it this time around." The Simurgh's human avatar emerged from the alleyway, facing away from my current position, arms comfortably at her side. I didn't allow myself to feel to grateful for the respect, since we both knew that we both knew she didn't need her eyes to see me, or her arms to attack me, trying to present herself like a normal person would have just put me further on my guard and harmed her apparent goal of not picking a fight.

I blinked as I finished parsing that thought. Wow, dealing with precogs was annoying, no wonder Dinah and Tattletale could never get along very well. Still, on my own I couldn't beat Simurgh's precog. I could probably resist some of her mental compulsions, there was a reason I had spent so much time learning Occlumency and the mental aspects of the force, but I needed something extra to stave off her manipulations. So I pulled out my top of the line cell phone, one of the few changes I had made from my original life, and pulled up the Scion tracker app. He couldn't be followed directly by satellite, but with enough people tracking the disturbances and posting news about him, it was possible to figure out his approximate co-ordinates at any given time. I checked the numbers on the screen.

Latitude: -52.81412, Longitude: 166.34102, Distortion: 2.74

I took two steps forward, two steps to the left and spoke four words.

"What do you want?"

The Simurgh's posture noticeably relaxed and became far more fluid after I moved based on her biggest blind spot. She turned to face me, a small smile on her lips. Judging by the rest of her body language this was supposed to be a beaming smile.

"There we go!" Her voice was similarly much more energetic in tone and inflection, her previous words had reminded me of a badly damaged Dragon drone, but these sounded more like Cuff after a good sparring match. "I've still got my probability sense to figure out what's likely to happen next, and my post-cog can still figure out where you are, but my actual long term view of you is shot as long as you periodically keep that up." I raised an eyebrow and resolved to get a more secure and reliable brand of Scion tracking than an unsecured cell phone line. "Since you are the most interesting thing on the planet, my best chance for survival, and the person who taught me not to be an emotionless murder robot, we should be friends." She stuck her hand out for me to shake. I checked my phone again.

Latitude: -5.44331, Longitude: 91.89452, Distortion: 1.01

One friendly action, begin preparations for two takedown strategies, one word.

"Expressionless?" I asked. She certainly didn't seem that way now. I stepped forward to shake her hand, setting my spiders' to tying strands to the structural weak points of the closest building, and ready the strongest blast of force lightning I could manage.

"Almost completely." She nodded as she shook my hand twice before letting go. "Right now I'm acting like I would if I had my emotional depth and human understanding I gain in the future, but I don't have any context as to why I should do them, or personal impulse to perform them. I should develop such in the future, and will then explain it to my self that is now." She smiled and began walking along the course towards where Lung should be meeting with the ABB. Right, I should hurry if I want to get there in time. Although with my plan for this loop very much ruined, I'm not sure if I see the point. Having the Simurgh around will produce enough changes that the plan would be ruined anyway.

"I will grow to enjoy Tattletale's company. However, that probability is lessened if you are not a member of the Undersiders." The Simurgh stops and turns back to look at me. I think she is trying to pout. I shrug, deciding why the hell not go along with this. It'll be something new at least. If I could tolerate loops spent with Dr. Mother and the rest of Cauldron, then it's not like an Endbringer is that much worse. I begin to jog towards that oh so familiar roof top. I check my mental defenses one more time, and then start questioning my new future friend.

"What should I call you? What story are we giving Lisa and the rest? Has the Simurgh disappeared from orbit? And are you seriously planning on going anywhere in that outfit?"

"Highest probability has you calling me Sam without costume and Delphi when on the job. I am a recently triggered thinker with a neglectful father. I have some precognitive and extra-sensory abilities and noticed bugs acting strangely, I approached you and pointed you in the direction of Lung." She raises her hand and points along the route we were already following. "This is all true, but misleading, high probability she follows it down the wrong path and doesn't figure out my secret for at least two months." She shrugged, slowing as we came within a block of the ABB meeting. "As for your other questions, I have left a decoy in orbit, and to the best of my knowledge avoided any detection. As for the costume," She hunched defensively, turning her head away from me. "I only had a day or so to make this body after I recovered from my awakening. I'll come up with something better by the time you want to introduce me to the team." Finished pretending to be embarrassed her head snapped around to lock eyes with me. Well, eye and blank bandana. "I want to keep the eye covering look." She spoke with surprising vehemence.

"I could get you something workable in spider silk." I offered, that way no one would think to ask why it was grey. I must be mad, going along with this plan, but if I wasn't a little bit crazy after doing this for so many centuries, then I would be the only Looper in existence that wasn't.

"It will be my first gift, and I will attach strong emotional context to its continued existence." The Simurgh informed me, sliding back into her earlier modes of speech. "Unless you choose to alter your course, I will see you tomorrow." She stopped and gestured towards the fire escape I had planned to use. "It seems that I should now wish you good luck, although we both know you could handle this blinded, limbless, and three miles away. So I don't know why I should do so." She spoke in a whisper, in order to avoid Lung's super hearing. I'm not sure why she bothered, at this point in his speech, Lung was to busy preparing to be a dragon to get distracted by a single voice.

"It's a human thing. I'll see you at library after Tattletale arranges the meeting okay?" She nods. "Later Delphi." She nods again before turning and sprinting away, as I set my body on autopilot up the fire escape and check the positioning of Armsmaster, Oni Lee, and the Undersiders I also checked closely on the bugs near Dinah Alcott. I decided that Coil was going to be sorely disappointed in his attempts to kidnap her, but might be surprised by her decision to join the Undersiders. I could use a second precog around to help diffuse my paranoia about Delphi. Still, this promised to be interesting. I was bored enough to devote the past several years of my life to getting each Endbringer painted pink, so hanging out with one should provide a much better diversion from the endless waiting.

* * *

1.12 (Rex)

"Gaah!" Aegis had been walking a standard evening patrol with Clockblocker when his white clad friend suddenly threw himself forward with a strangled yell. Clockblocker quickly rolled to the left from where he landed on the ground, swinging up his left hand and stopping suddenly when he saw Aegis. "Oh. Huh."

Clockblocker regained his footing and rubbed his right arm, bringing his hand in front of his face and clenching it a few times before he turned his attention back to Aegis. "Sorry, what were you saying?"

"I asked if you were alright." Aegis repeated himself. Clockblocker had a strange sense of humor, but randomly flopping to the ground on patrol would have been a serious escalation of his jokes. Especially with how tense he had seemed for a moment. As team leader he should be responsible about this sort of thing.

"I'm fine man, just tripped is all. Hold on for a sec, got to send a text real quick." Clockblocker waved off his friend's concern. He pulled out his ward issued cell phone and sent a very short text. Aegis noted that he had had to type out the number it was being sent to. Another oddity, Aegis began to wonder if he should report this in and engage the stanger/master protocols. Clockblocker was acting entirely too strange. The time stopper had been about to put his phone away when it suddenly began to ring. With a shrug Clockblocker hit the answer button and put the phone up to his ear.

"BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

The phone was quickly removed from his ear. The laughter continued unabated.

"Clockblocker what-"

"Man, I don't even know." Clockblocker brought the phone closer to his mouth, keeping it well away from his ear. "Bugsy, this is Dennis. What the hell is going on over there? You're laugh is freaking me out more than that time I finally figured out who Sam was." The laughter didn't stop, but a new voice did cut in.

"Yeah, your face was hilarious." This voice was that of a teenaged female, amusement clear in her voice. "Whatever it is, she apparently felt the need to share it in a conference call with everyone in our little social circle. Dragon you have any insights?"

"Not really Tattletale" Aegis did recognize the new voice, although why the world's greatest tinker knew a two bit thief, Dennis, and an insane woman was beyond him. "She got me set up and such, mentioned she should start working on her suit and then this started happening. It seems to be a happy laugh judging by her expression."

"It's haha It's… I have Panacea's power. Hehehe" The laughter finally started to calm down, but the speaker was still quite giddy. Aegis saw Dennis frown underneath his mask and mirrored the expression. That clearly wasn't Amy on the phone, so how could someone else have her powers? Dennis interrupted just before Aegis could start pressing for answers.

"While terrifying, it's not like this hasn't happened before. So what's got you so excited." Aegis felt even more confused. What did he mean, happened before? Clockblocker had clearly gone crazy. Now Ageis just had to figure out how to alert the Protectorate without alarming his friend.

"I still have my normal power and-" The voice was interrupted.

"Dibs"

"Di- aww damnit." The first speaker had been Tattletale with Clockblocker half a second after. "Well, before you go join up with them, would you mind popping over to the hospital and healing my dad for-" Yet another interruption. Either everyone involved in this phone call was very rude, or they were simply close enough friends that they knew what the other would say.

"Already did it." Clockblocker gave the phone a quizzical look. Before he could pronounce his question the as of yet unidentified caller continued. "I wasn't finished speaking yet. I have my powers, Panacea's power and" Aegis flinched back from the sudden mass of bugs that descended upon them and formed themselves into a humanoid pillar. Clockblocker didn't even seem to notice. "The ability to use it through my swarm." Halfway through the last part of the sentence the sound was suddenly in stereo as the mass of bugs cleared to display a fully formed human female.

She was tall for someone her apparent age. Quite lithe and well muscled, with dark curly hair intelligent eyes, and a nice tan. The last aspect was particularly noticeable considering that, well.

"Clothes, Taylor. You forgot to make clothes." Clockblocker, didn't seem affected at all by the new arrival. Which just furthered Aegis's concern for his friend. Aegis was avoiding looking directly at the new girl, but Dennis had no such problem. It wasn't an appraising look, or anything like that, simply viewed with the same amount of interest as any other day-to-day event.

"Oh, right." Taylor's skin rippled and black, chitinous armor ripped itself into existence from under her skin. A grey, silk like material followed suit, covering everything the armor didn't. Her new look was completed when a pair of spiders grew out of her forehead and quickly gathered her hair into a loose ponytail.

Clockblocker sighed. "And now I can't enjoy women for the next several years and/or many many therapy sessions." He turned to Aegis. "Say, boss man. Do you like movies about Gladiators?"

"Sorry about that, I can recreate myself perfectly, but clothes are a separate step and I'm a bit distracted at the moment. With all the relay bugs and the extra refinement coming from every extra body I make, this is taxing even my ability to multitask." Clockblocker ignored the girl stepping closer to Aegis and clapping a hand on his shoulder.

"I said," Clockblocker repeated, raising his voice to speak over Taylor's next words, something about the great pizza place she had just found in New York. "Do you like movies about Gladiators? Or do you perhaps spend time hanging around the Gym?"

"No, I-" Aegis blinked and realized he was talking to himself. He looked around and noticed a sticky note had been stuck to his chest. He pulled it off and read it, unable to believe that Clockblocker had just used his power on a superior officer in the middle of patrol.

Quitting the Wards. Srry. But I for one, welcome our new insectiod overlords. See you later. Undersiders for life. :)

Aegis stood on that street for a good three minutes, trying to figure out what just happened. In the meantime, Taylor did a whirlwind tour of European eateries, killed every member of the Slaughterhouse 9, ruined Saint's day, and left Sleeper the hell alone.

* * *

1.13 (Zulaq)

I am tired.

I have been going through the same few years over and over again, endlessly repeating the same thing over and over again.

At first it seemed like a blessing, a chance to do everything over again and make things right.

Joining the Wards, sticking with the Undersiders, going rogue, join New Wave, I've done it all.

Beat Leviathan, Kill Behemoth, Destroy the Simurgh, Eradicate Scion, I can do it.

Keep the city intact, save lives, make the world a better place, it has been done.

But what is the point?

This blessing is nothing but a curse. My achievements, my friends, my family, all are meaningless in this endlessly repeating world.

I have done everything, except one thing.

Make it stop.

"Oh she's waking up!"

"Get out of the way Urd, I want to see!"

"Common squirt, we should let Belldandy deal with this."

Voices I have never heard before.

I opened my eyes. Hovering over me was a beautiful blonde haired woman, with an expression of caring concern in her blue eyes, and a soft smile on her lips.

"W-Who are you?" I asked, my voice soft.

"Oh hello! I am the goddess Belldandy, it is a pleasure to meet you."

Goddesses, that's what they thought they were. All three of the women present believed that they were goddesses. Belldandy, with her motherly kind looks, Urd with her skimpy outfit and Skuld with her tinker-robot, all thought they were goddesses. Are they nuts?!

"Oh no, not at all!" Belldandy said reassuringly.

Wait a minute! Did she just-

"-Read your thoughts. She's a goddess, of course she can." Urd interjected.

If I wasn't so sore I would have gotten as far away from the three nutters as quickly as my feet could carry me. But I was so tired and sore, and I couldn't feel any bugs, so all I could manage was a gurgling, "G-get out of my head!"

"Of course," Belldandy immediately replied, "I wouldn't dream of violating your privacy."

Before I could come up with a comeback, after all she expected me to belive that she'd keep out of my mind simply because I asked, Urd interrupted, with a frown on her face "We need to tell her now."

"But Urd, I thought we agreed that we'd wait until she was better!" Belldandy protested.

"We'll get nowhere if she gets it into her paranoid little head that we're her enemies." Urd explained, "So let's explain everything now."

What was she talking about, explain what?

"I suppose you are right." Belldandy turned to me again, her smile had faded but her eyes were still kind. She bowed to me, "I, Belldandy, goddess first class, unlimited license, would like to offer the apologies of both myself and all other gods and goddesses of Asguard to Taylor Hebert, and through her, her world, for our unconscionable neglect, and errors of judgment which have led to the current situation." She gave me a deep bow.

What was she talking about? A goddess apologizing to me, for neglect?

Urd spoke up, "You see squirt, we're goddesses. We're not some whacked out parahumans, or other such that you might have first thought. And it's our job to keep all of everything running smoothly. To do that we have what some of more limited minds might consider an eleven-dimensional supercomputer called Yagdrassil. Now like every computer, Yagdrassil can have the occasional bug, and being the computer which runs all realities everywhere, bugs lead to odd effects on the worlds we administrate. One of these bugs, (totally not my fault), caused Yagdrassil to crash. Fortunately we have backups, unfortunately the process of recovering the lost data which wasn't backed up will take billions, if not trillions of years, during which we can't have realities running as normal because they might be missing things. So we put everything on a holding pattern, we set each world to loop, centered around an anchor who we had the complete data set for. These anchors would relive segments of their lives over and over again, testing things out and stretching reality in predictable ways to aid our repairs."

Looping parts of their lives again and again? Did she mean that I was one of these anchors, and these three were responsible?

"Unfortunately, your situation is a bit more complicated than your average anchor."

I blinked. More complicated than all of reality crashing and having to repeat?

"Normal worlds are created in measured ways, every little detail is checked and double checked before even starting, and are subjected to constant review as they grow and expand. Occasionally we'll find glitches and bugs and we'll quarantine them before eventually deleting them. Unfortunately, we've been so busy with the reset that nobody has cleared the quarantine zone for eons. The various bits of leftover data coalesced into multiple worlds, all overlapping each other and without actual administrative oversight to ensure everything was working correctly. Your world is one of these."

Wait a minute, was she saying that my entire life, and the world it took place on, was some sort of cosmic mistake! I was angry, I was furious. How dare they!

"Now if we had our way, we would move your world and the others out of the quarantine zone and into some stable realities where we could work on stabilizing and properly integrating those worlds. But we kind of ran into a tinisy winsy problem. You see, the various bugs and malware which we dumped into the quarantine zone also coalesced into a bigger problem. And while they cannot leave the quarantine, they did usurp our control within the zone. They divided the admin abilities between themselves and spread out, going from one world in the zone to another, breeding and using the destruction of the world to go to another."

That sounded vaguely familiar… She was talking about the entities! So Scion was-a computer virus!

"While the virus entities stole the admin key, they were unable to actually use it to its proper potential due to the fact they convince the key they were actual gods or goddesses. The admin key became just one among many of shards which the viruses carried from world to world. Until yours. For some reason, on your world, the virus gave out the admin key, and you were the one to receive it. You could not tap into its full potential, it could easily tell that you were not a goddess, but you still used it well."

So my passenger was the key to my world? But what did that even mean?

"Then something occurred which I, and almost every other goddess, would have considered impossible."

I did not like the sound of that.

"You see, you tapped into your potential so much, and gained such abilities that the admin key, for just a moment, confused you for a goddess."

What?

"And it tried to bond with you in lieu of the normal Yagdrassil mainframe. Somehow it succeeded, and gave you administrative rights and access to all of the quarantine zone. Since you do not have the experience necessary to actually use these permissions, things weren't too bad. Then, right after your battle with the virus, you came to the conclusion that if you could, you would do everything different. With your emotions spiking you unconsciously accessed your admin permissions, and set your world to loop."

If I could, I would have laughed and cried at the same time. But first I needed an answer. "H-how do I fix it?"

Urd shook her head, sorrow in her eyes. "As you are now, you can't."

"B-Bullshit!"

"The only actual way for you to end the loops is if you were to ascend to a full admin. In order to do that, you need experience. Fortunately, you can gain plenty of that in the loops." She gives me a smile, "The closer you get towards the endpoint the greater control you'll have over your own loops. Eventually, down the road, you will get out of the loops."

The three goddesses bowed to me again, smiles on their faces. "And on that day, we will welcome you as one of us."

…

…

…

What.

* * *

1.14 (RedshirtZombie)

Piggot briefly lamented her damaged kidneys as she watched Dragon's footage. The fight against Simurgh had started out better than anticipated. While no casualties were reported yet, Simurgh's distinctive scream had been noted by several observing thinkers, meaning that the damage was being invested for future returns. The high point of the battle had been Dragon's combat units managing to get a ward close enough to affect the Endbringer directly.

Then Dragon's drones had promptly started painting the Simurgh pink. Something in Piggot's gut clenched; evidently, even Dragon had fallen to the siren song of madness.

Swarms of something were closing on the pinned Endbringer as well; probably controlled by 'Skitter', or whatever her name was. These brushed over various pink spots, detailing it with black marker- smilies here, a monocle around where an eye should be, a moustache with excess coiling there...

On ground level, it looked like there were arguments forming off-radio, A random radio check revealed an argument between neon-green polka-dots and a painted tuxedo pattern.

Finally, Clockblocker's powers wore off, and the Simurgh started to resume its attack - only to stop fighting, abruptly move to a somewhat-distant skyscraper, and stare at its reflection for a moment. It then floated back to the docks, waved its arms, and floated there. A giant wave rose from the ocean, crashed over it, abruptly lowered its crest, and doused every street within a mile of the shore just high enough to leave no cape un-rinsed. Its paint washed off, the Simurgh promptly flew back into the stratosphere, to the cheering of the crowd.

Despite her antipathy towards capes and her lacking paycheck, Piggot promptly began mentally scheduling an appointment with Panacea. Forget the paperwork, this kind of thing could not pass without sufficient alcohol.

* * *

1.12 cont (Rex)

"I said," Clockblocker repeated, raising his voice to speak over Taylor's next words, something about the great pizza place she had just found in New York. "Do you like movies about Gladiators? Or do you perhaps spend lots of time hanging around the Gym?"

"No, I-" Aegis blinked and realized he was talking to himself. "What the hell?" he muttered as he looked around. Everyone was dressed in grey jumpsuits and continuing about their business like nothing happened. However, it was suddenly overcast. He looked up and realized that the sun wasn't being blocked by clouds. There were huge swarms of giant bugs flying around above him. "Shit. What just happened?" Aegis usually made a point of not cursing in public, but felt that this situation warranted it.

"Citizen 597633, why are you not wearing your mandatory skittersuit? You know that if you are found in violation of the dress code, you will be sentenced to 11 bullet ant bites." The gray haired man shook his head at Aegis and quickly moved about his business, seemingly not wanting to be associated with the outsider. Aegis stepped forward to follow the man, but as soon as he moved the swarms in the sky reacted. The one closest to him swirled downward in a funnel, coalescing into a pillar of writhing insects with a woman's face attached to it.

"Citizen 597633. You are in violation of dress code. You have not submitted the paperwork for extraneous garments. You have not submitted the paperwork to register your parahuman abilities. You have not reported to your assigned work cycle for the past seven hundred and forty five day cycles. In light of these offenses, you have been judged a disruptive element to hive unity and will thus be summarily recycled for biomass. Thank you for your cooperation with this process." Her cold and monotone speech completed the pillar began to advance on Aegis. It was interrupted when someone ran in between him and the pillar girl. With the sharp red hair and familiar body structure, Aegis was able to recognize Dennis. He was dressed in the same grey jumpsuit as everyone else.

"Lady Skitter, wait for a moment if you will. Recall that Citizen 597633 has been timelocked for the past seven hundred and seventy five day cycles. I froze him on the first day of your awakening. In light of my long service and my personal relationship with the primary node I ask that you grant him lenience." Clockblocker finished his plea by dropping to his knees and bowing before Skitter.

"… Very well Citizen 17. Citizen 597633 shall be granted one day cycle to file the appropriate paperwork. However, you have deserted your assigned workplace. In light of these offenses you have been judged a disruptive element to hive unity and will thus be summarily recycled for biomass. Thank you for your cooperation with this process." And the bugs swarmed over Clockblocker. Aegis charged forward to save his friend but the bugs parted around him, easily avoiding his blows. The only thing that he accomplished was obscuring his view. The bugs cleared away from him, circling rapidly around him, Clockblocker was gone.

Aegis fell to his knees in grief. He had failed. As a friend, as a leader, as a hero. The world had fallen under control of an evil bug controller and he had been helpless to stop her from killing someone right in front of him. He barely noticed the bugs leaving the area or how the day cleared up very quickly. He did notice when someone walked into the area in normal clothing. And then another. A car drove by. When questioned, none of the civilians had any idea what he was talking about.

Meanwhile, in a refurbished warehouse across town…

Laughter. High pitched, low rumbling, cackling, muffled sniggers. A veritable buffet of amused sounds ran freely throughout the room. High fives were exchanged. Vista was congratulated on her increased skill at bending air to create the illusion of larger size. Armsmaster was thanked for his quick cordoning off of an entire city block, although he placed most of the credit towards Dragon's efforts. She was also praised for her teleporter working despite the interference caused by Skitter's bugs.

All in all, Clockblocker and Regent declared that this prank ranked highly on their list of most satisfying. Skitter was just glad it took less effort than the time they decided to try and make Contessa show up to the Brockton Bay Leviathan attack in a tutu and chase Leviathan off with the power of interpretive dance. The rest of the group was trying to figure out a way to make sure that Taylor didn't decide to take it as a business outline.

* * *

1.15 (Slayer Anderson)

"...next time, I take on the Empire. The ABB is just getting too easy," I sighed, palm my face as I looked down on the silk-bound forms of thirty asian thugs, Oni Lee, Bakuda, and Lung. All of them were covered in various insect stings, bites, and other assorted nastiness. It had taken a very specific set of actions to get Bakuda to come out with the other two ABB capes, a scenario which had taken five loops to perfect.

I was still debating whether or not it was worth it.

"Holy Hell," I heard an utterance from behind me, not surprising me in the least. My swarm had picked up the standard 'Undersiders Entrance' on Bitch's dogs, the massive animals easy to track through my expanded sense.

"You can say that again," Brian, Grue, said lowly. "Uh, hey-"

"-she knows we're here," Lisa, Tattletale, spoke up. "It's the bugs. She can...oh, that's broken. She can sense through them. Yeah, all of them individually and collectively. Fuck, and she's got a big range."

I felt a smile tugging at the edge of my mouth as I shifted some bugs about, attracting their attention as a mass shifted to a humanoid form. Their 'bodies' mimicked my own slightly off-proportion form with fully articulated arms, legs, torsos, even a mimicry of faces. I even went

the extra mile and placed a few fireflies in their 'eyes' for full effect. I'd been practicing. There wasn't much else to do.

"I can also use them to speak," my swarm said.

"I think that's simultaneously the creepiest and most awesome thing I've ever seen," Regent commented.

"And she's a hero," Tattletale said suddenly, her eyes wide.

"Shit," Grue cursed as the tension racketed up again. "Listen we're-"

"The Undersiders," I spoke up, turning to show off my outfit. It looked more 'heroic' than my classic Skitter costume. I'd decided to go for the Wards again this loop, if only because being a 'villain' was getting stale. "I know."

"Been planning to hit us?" Tattletale asked, then shook her head. "No...she knows us, more than just talk around town. She's...some kind of thinker? Yes, but not like that, damn."

"Tattletale, I kind of need answers here, what's up?" Grue pressed.

"She's a new cape, came across the Lung and his friends, took them out, she's disappointed. It was...too easy!? Damn, and this is her first time out? No? Yes? Both? Okay, what the fuck?" Tattletale cried, her hand pressed to her temple.

My lips were twitching now. I had been worried the first time Lisa had reacted this way. Usually, nowadays at least, I managed enough self-control to cover the tells and hints a normal person gave off. Still, every now and then it was fun to let her try and figure me out.

"She knows how my power works," Tattletale groaned. "She's fucking with us."

Bitch was staring at the byplay apathetically. "Are we gonna' fight or not?"

"No," I stated, nearly laughing. "I think taking down the ABB is enough for one night. Besides, the Undersiders are strictly small-time, as far as I know-"

"That's a lie," Tattletale interjected. "Only you're telling the truth. Okay, seriously, how the hell does that fucking work?"

"Could we stop trying to piss off the cape that just took down Lung and his entire gang?" Regent asked idly, almost curiously.

I waggled my hand, "Lie, truth, it's complicated. You guys should really get going, Armsmaster's on his way."

"Yeah, we should," Grue nodded, then paused as he turned to leave. "We didn't get your name, by the way."

"Weaver," I stated firmly. While trying to be the creepiest hero in Brockton Bay wearing my Skitter costume was fun, I'd done that a few loops prior, right after that one where I went New Wave. That was unusual enough to be fun as well.

And that's what it boiled down to, wasn't it?

Fighting off the boredom.

The endless repetition.

"Thanks, then," Grue said eventually. "We owe you one. A big one, for this. Not enough to turn ourselves in, but...if you ever need any less-than-heroic help, give us a call."

I replied in the affirmative, going back to studying my captures for the night.

"...yeah, next time I'm taking out the Empire. Lung's actually getting boring. Maybe I should give him a head start and let him ramp up? That might help." It said something that I was actually considering the notion, something crazy.

Then again, could I really say I was sane anymore?

The quiet whine of a tinker-tech motorcycle approached.

...I wondered if I would have to deal with Armsmaster when I took down the E88? Come to think of it, why was I meeting Armsmaster again? It was weirdly specific that he showed up almost every time during my first outing. Maybe there was some patrol schedule the senior Protectorate capes used that I hadn't been privy to. Ah well, something to look into, especially if it got me extra variety.


	2. Chapter 2

1.12 cont (Rex)

"Oh come on Clockblocker it's not that bad."

"Yes, Taylor, yes it is. You are made of bugs. And have been freely turning yourself back and forth between the two states whenever you feel like it."

"I have not. And look, I've got a fully bio-adjustable body. That has to count for something."

"why would that matter?"

A huff of exasperation. "Look, normal size. Now their big. Now their huge. Tiny again. Now I have two sets. Now their gigantic, and back to normal. Get the picture?"

"That would be fascinating. But there's one little problem. THEY ARE MADE OF BUGS! Bugs still kind of freak me out. You know this. I know this. Everyone who's spent a loop awake knows this."

"This is my first time and I know this. Also, Clocky is right. Seeing you build yourself like that has killed my desire for female companionship for the foreseeable future."

"Thank you for illustrating my point Regent. Skitter, I hope you realize Imp is going to try to murder you when she learns about this."

"Fine, be that way! I'll go hang out with people that aren't such weak stomached wimps."

"Dissolving into a pile of wasps is not going to strengthen your argument!" Clockblocker shouted as Skitter flew that portion of her body away. "So Alec, my old friend, what are you watching?"

"Gladiator movies."

Regent and Clockblocker locked eyes.

"Turkish prison time?"

Clockblocker walked over to Regent. The two stared into each others eyes.

"You didn't say that, did you?" They spoke at the same time.

"Dammit! Will you two just kiss already?!" Aisha yelled in frustration, dropping her powers as she was once again denied the chance to watch Alec make out with one his male teammates. Excluding her brother of course. Even with the loops, that would still be far too awkward.

"…" The pair looked over to Aisha. They looked back toward the other. A shared understanding passed between them.

"Nope. Can't be sure it isn't secretly made of bugs."

* * *

2.1 (RedshirtZombie)

I pushed the door open, and looked at what my loop memories said were my minions for the night. Eager faces - some pale, some dark, some tattoo-covered, and one looking like they got pulled out of a business meeting. Thing is, I can recognize my armoring technique at a glance, and each piece of clothing here- even the suit - was clearly spider silk, and the weaponry being wielded was better quality than what Joe Norm would expect a bunch of thugs to carry.

Loop memories wanted me to start a morale-boosting speech about taking out an E88 gang, but this alleyway was too familiar. Because I knew it, from every loop I'd started here- I was just used to seeing it from a different perspective. Instincts had swarms pulling in instantly, even past the body-layer this version of me already had, but I knew the best option for these people would be to preemptively call, "Everybody clear out!" as I looked upwards.

Above, a body vaulted the edge of one building, clearly intending to land in the midst of the crowd. I knew who it was, even before I got a good look.

Lung snorted, as he stood up from his landing, the nearest minion chest-high to him. "Bit late for that, I'm afraid."

This is going to suck.

* * *

2.2 (Inara Seraph)

The right time, at the right place- The Most Powerful Man in the World was all too happy to introduce me to Scion once he realized I was serious about believing him, and even more serious about wanting to meet Scion.

Once the Golden Idiot showed his face, I prepared myself for a nice demoralizing speech. This had actually taken quite a few loops to perfect- oftentimes Scion would just ignore me, and there was seemingly no rhyme nor reason to what he decided to listen to.

"Why are you still here? The cycle is broken- you have no reason to exist. Disappear."

Scion turned his head slowly in my direction. I tapped my foot impatiently, already feeling bored. Saving the world lost its charm a long time ago. But I wanted to do stuff in civilization this time around, and that required an intact world- I was just going about it the most efficient way I knew. "..."

Suddenly, without warning, Scion lept into the sky with a mighty leap and exploded in a shower of golden light, leaving not a trace behind. Those that witnessed it happen could only stare in mute shock.

I snorted derisively. "I can't believe he falls for it every time. Idiot."

"Y-you! You killed him!" the hobo shouted at me, not fully comprehending what had just happened.

I rolled my eyes. "Good thing too, he's a fucking psycho." I didn't feel bad at all insulting him. I'd tried to be friends with him multiple loops, tagging along on all his little 'saving people' excursions and even joining him in exterminating the human race a couple times. The problem was, he was just too fucking stupid. It was like trying to be genuine friends with a toddler- the relationship was inherently unequal.

"But what about the Endbringers? Without Scion.. we'll never make it," he said, dejected.

I smirked, then tapped the communications device on my ear. "See, I knew you'd ask that- Hey, Eidolon, you hear me?"

"I- I can't believe it. It was really that easy all along?" He still hadn't gotten over his shock.

"Right, so that should be sufficient proof that my other claims aren't just bullshit."

"Yes.. yes, I think we need to talk."

Every. Single. Time. He never believes me at first. Even after I solve Cauldron's number one problem for them, he still has the balls to doubt me. Ass. Well, that's not fair- Eidolon's a pretty cool guy once he doesn't have the weight of the world on his shoulders. But until he 'bonds' with his Endbringer bros, I have to put up with his personality.

"Like I said. They exist to help you become stronger. As long as they're fulfilling that requirement, they'll remain dormant."

The plan was simple- Doormaker finds a nice, uninhabited world for him to play in, and then he and the Endbringers beat the shit out of each other. The problem is it requires Eidolon to get over his stupid goddamned martyr complex and really take on the High Priest mantle, as GU would say.

"Have a little faith. Your powers won't fail you- you'll come back alive, I promise."

I could see him being convinced by my words- or at least, convinced enough to see if my words had something behind them. He walked through the portal with a look of determination on his face.

World = Saved. Now, I can finally work on what I really wanted to do this loop.

"You stupid or something?" a skeptical man said. He looked dubiously at the ramshackle stand I'd set up in Brockton Bay's public square. On the top in scribbled handwriting it read:

Free Powers

"Nope," I said cheerily. "Just say the word and you're a parahuman. It's easy."

The look of disbelief in his eyes didn't fade. He shook his head. "You're fucking crazy."

I continued to stare at him, waiting for him to finish. He hesitated a moment, before continuing, "..and I'm even crazier for thinking you can do anything."

He sighed heavily, then drew himself up. "Alright, then. Do it."

I waved my arms in a useless, but demonstrative, gesture. "Done."

The customary entity vision overloaded his brain and I waited for it to subside. My shard had so much experience and not enough people considered 'close' to me that it couldn't birth new shards fast enough. It had taken a long time for me to figure out how to directly manipulate what my shard did- but once I'd won the cooperation of my shard on the matter, it had become much easier. I just had to accept that the shard had, maybe not a sentient mind behind it, but something coming close.

The first thing I always did was tell it to stop that don't make my Dad a parahuman, because it always tried to do that. I'd done that a couple loops, and it inevitably made my dad miserable- I wasn't going to do that to him. I loved my dad, sort of, but I wasn't close to him- wasn't close to anybody, and the only reason it tried to do that was because we were related by blood.

So now, I was gifting random strangers with powers to document just what they manifested as. I was interested to see what sort of variety of powers my shard could grant. Almost always, they were Master powers, but sometimes there were oddities like that guy who could control vectors, which made him ridiculously powerful as a front-line combatant and pretty much invincible.

"Whoa.." he said.

"Told you. Easy."

"Haha.. hahaha! This is great!"

Hmm.. control over plants, I guess? At least, that's what I'm deducing from the way he's making all the grass grow ten feet tall. "Oi, stop that, idiot." I made him de-grow everything back to normal.

He looked sheepish, but quickly transitioned into thanking me profusely for giving him the chance to take control of his life, etc, etc- yeah, do whatever you want with them. Don't care.

The next guy lined up, glowering at me. "How do I know you didn't stage that bit with him, eh?"

I gave him a look that said, Are you fucking kidding me? that pretty adequately summed up my thoughts on his question. "Why would I bother? Or is the concept of -free powers- not penetrating your mind properly?"

He hmmm'd thoughtfully but stood rooted to the spot, not moving away. I sighed impatiently. "Do you want powers or not?"

"Fine."

One satisfied customer later, I added another note to my list o' Admin powers: control of wind currents. The guy could fly, that was pretty neat.

A few dozen customers later and the PRT decided to drop in to ask just what the hell was going on.

"What's going on here?"

I motioned to the sign. "Exactly what it looks like."

Then I looked at him speculatively. He was an officer, but not a parahuman. I could fix that. "Say, you want powers? I could do your whole department."

To cut a long story short, Brockton Bay soon was populated by 98% parahumans. That was a fun loop.

* * *

2.3 (Inara Seraph)

All the pieces are in place. I'll get to see her.. soon.

"How's it going, Nilbog, Bonesaw?"

They glare balefully in my direction. If they could, they'd kill me a thousand times over. But they can't- they're powerless. They wouldn't be capable of anything if I didn't need their minds intact. I could use their bodies like puppets, but to use their art in the complicated way I want them to- I can't lift that information from their brains. They have to do it. All it took was a little.. persuasion.

"It's done," Bonesaw says through gritted teeth. She shivers. I'd had her working on it for days with Nilbog- who isn't the most pleasant of partners to work with.

I look at their handiwork. It's the spitting image of my mother, lying motionless on an operating table. It's not really my mother.. not yet. I needed to recall something more arcane to bring her to life as more than a brainless zombie. That was where my other piece came in.

"Come here," I command, but the phrase is redundant. She can't say anything, nor can she refuse my orders. I know I could never persuade her to do anything, so I have to do it like this.

She pulls from the aether the ghost I'm searching for- and thrusts it into the corpse. I wait with baited breath.

"Your turn, Panacea."

She steps forward with dull eyes. Though she's not under my direct control, the fight went out of her a long time ago. She obeys my commands dutifully, reaching out to my mother, and correcting any imperfections that arise.

My mother stirs. My heart beats faster as recognition dawns in her eyes when she sees me. I can tell immediately that it's really her. Finally, a true success.

"Welcome home, mom."

* * *

2.4 (Ridiculously Average Guy)

My eyes snap open.

Something was different. Different...but not necessarily wrong. Decades of repetition mean that any slight variation between iterations is extremely noticeable. Meaning this could be anything from a bug that normally isn't there, to Armageddon.

I listen, I hear-

An unfamiliar step.

Indistinct humming.

Ah. It was a break-in.

For the average person, somebody breaking into their house in the middle of the night would be terrifying.

I don't panic. Even at my base-line I would have figured out where the assailant was and taken them down. Maybe even without waking-up dad.

Now? I'm not sure I really can panic anymore, the loops had seen to that. After about a century in, I had basically lost all fear responses. Only thing left was a dull curiosity.

So, instead I speculate. Trying to guess who it could be.

I'd been prepping, and planning, but I hadn't actually fought anybody this loop. Well, anybody but low level merchants.

I had to train up my body if I was going to be able to do anything really useful, and this was an early loop. Nearly a whole year before I would get my powers. I shouldn't even be a blip on the radar.

More importantly, how had whoever this was managed to track down my real identity? Hmm, best to ask them directly.

Idly, I began planning my take down.

Things would be slightly more complicated, as I was currently pre-trigger, but I would still be able to take them down non-lethally. I'd pre-trapped the doorway, but (having a father who walked in occasionally) it was a distraction at best.

It seemed I would need more firepower.

In the leisurely half-second it took me to grab a butterknife and pepper spray from under the pillow, I mused on what I must have changed that caused a base-memory was a tad hazy, but I was certain this hadn't happened before.

Meh, either way, I'll know by the end of the night.

I just have to-

At that point I finally realized what the burglar was humming…the mission impossible theme.

That point was also when the person stepped inside and-

Was tangled in the yarn bolo.

Which forced the door closed behind them.

Which tripped them forward onto the scattered legos, and d4's.

Finally, having their head land on a stretch pillow.

I really liked the stretch pillow. It kept head wounds from happening, so there wouldn't be any blood on the floor. And, as an added bonus, it was thick enough to muffle pained screams!

At this point I'm already on the persons back, pushing their midriff further into the pointy bits, and have the butter knife at their throat. The pepper spray is just in case.

"Come on! Who the hell booby traps their room?!" She whines.

Oh. "Hi Imp."

* * *

2.5 (Slayer Anderson)

I looked through my notes again. I wanted to be sure I did this right. The alternative didn't bear thinking about. The...permanence of this wasn't something I came in contact with much anymore. It was weird to be so worried about something after so long, strange in a way that reminded me how much the loops had affected me. My mind. My outlook. Nothing had 'mattered' for...a very long time, not since I realized the loops wouldn't be ending anytime soon, at least.

I shook my head and looked back to the display screen once again.

I didn't want to screw this up...again. Last time, when I'd tried to get Amy and Victoria to remember the 'Prime Loop'...they had only remembered the time I'd masqueraded as 'Jitterbug,' a mad, dance and prank-themed villain.

That had been...fun...and embarrassing.

Of course, that wasn't even broaching the time I'd accidentally made Vista remember one of her 'evil loops.' I'd probably never be able to look at her the same way again, not after seeing her depose Jack Slash and lead the Slaughterhouse 9 to team up with the Three Blasphemies.

Both of those loops had ended...badly.

I shook my head again, clearing my thoughts.

The Norns...the Goddesses in charge of the past, present, and future...they had explained everything. I'd spent...decades, at least, learning from Skuld over and over again, trying to get the barest grip on my capabilities as...

I closed my eyes.

Khepri.

That was what they'd called me the first time I'd gone to war against Scion. It was the name of an ancient Egyptian deity. I wondered if it was prophecy, sometimes. Maybe it was just some mad coincidence, maybe it was just serendipity? In the end, after everything I'd learned in...Heaven, after the time I'd spent with Hild in Hell, I'd accepted it.

I was Skitter.

I was Weaver.

...and I was Khepri.

Goddess First Class, Unlimited License...although that was a bit of a misnomer. There hadn't been anything like me...ever, as far as the Norns knew. I was somewhere between divine and mortal, stuck in a kind of limbo with powers far beyond most humans, but not quite up to my weight class in the titles I held. I was also unaffiliated with either Heaven or Hell, something which was almost equally unheard of. I was a free agent, outside of the doublet system, and without any kinds of 'rules' or restraints on any powers I had or would develop.

Belldandy and Hild had made it clear that either Hell or Heaven would be happy to have me, of course.

I wasn't planning on making that choice any time soon, though, if ever.

...still, that didn't change how thankful I was to Skuld for explaining how some of the permission changes worked in the Yggdrasil system. This was technically beyond my current ability, but Mara had slipped me a few under the table hints to certain hacks she used when 'bending' the rules. A glowing tablet of light hovered in front of me as I concentrated on double-check my changes. With everything set up properly, or at least to the best of my current ability, I closed out the windows and waited.

I didn't have to wait long.

Lisa and Alec were first. Even knowing their real names, they'd always be Lisa and Alec to me. They'd been napping, taking their time to sleep in after a job we'd pulled the night before. They were both looking around with a mixture of shock, alarm, and disbelief.

I sipped my cup of espresso quietly.

There were perks to having your own pocket dimension...deific realm...whatever. The perk I was enjoying most currently? Coffee anytime I wanted it.

"Okay...not that I'm complaining, but...didn't I just bite the big one? I mean...taunting Behemoth isn't something you walk away from," Alex said dubiously, poking at his own flesh as if he were expecting it to give way.

Lisa looked...scared. Alarmed. Relieved. Suspicious.

Then her eyes met mine and I saw the recognition, the understanding.

"This is real," Lisa stated. Not asked.

I nodded.

"...how?" This time, it was a question. Her voice was small, tiny even. She was scared...of me.

I couldn't blame her.

I was pretty terrified of myself, too, some days.

"Long story," I sighed, taking my time as I sipped my drink. "I'd rather wait for the others, if that's okay? I'm going to be explaining things at least twice, as it is. More than that, right now..."

Lisa let out a shuddering breath, then dropped into the sofa.

"Yeah," she said, her face pale as she nodded. "I just...you're using that name. When we met, after you took down Lung...this time. You introduced yourself as Khepri. I didn't think...if you survived..."

I gave her a smile...though it was so bitter, sad, and wry it probably looked like anything but a happy expression. "It's...grown on me."

If it was possible, Lisa paled further. "Shit."

Alec, his expression unsure, had been watching the byplay silently, expectantly. Then, suddenly, he was bowled over by a mass of teenage girl that was suddenly just there, out of nowhere. When they landed, Aisha had Alec by the shirt, kissing him with a feverish passion. Pulling back, I saw something glistening in her eyes as she cocked back her fist and punched her boyfriend in the face.

"Don't you-ever-do anything like that again, you stupid, heroic, asshole!" Aisha practically screamed in his face.

Brian stepped into the room more slowly, looking around wonderingly.

We looked at each other, my own face wearing a tired smile and the easy confidence eternity had crafted within me. Brain's expression was uncomfortable, understandable really, given he remembered what we'd been through together.

"This...isn't a dream?" He asked cautiously, turning to look at Lisa.

"I think..." Lisa said slowly, "Taylor did something. It's real."

"Okay," Brain said, slowly allowing the facts of the situation to dawn on him before sitting down carefully on the sofa beside Lisa.

Then there was a pair of lips on mine.

Reflexes caught me before I could realize what was happening and by the time I noticed I decided it was too late to care. My tongue caught Aisha's, pressing her deeper against me. One more breathless moment and the younger girl pulled away, panting heavily. I snorted, "Not bad, you need to work on your technique, though."

The Undersiders, including Rachel now, stared at me.

"I-just, thanks," Aisha mumbled, her cheeks flushed as she realized what she'd done, then she pulled her cocky grin out. "I didn't realize you had it in you, bug girl. My bro teach you that?"

I shrugged with an easy-going smile. "Actually, I learned that from Aegis."

Another blank tone of silence.

I sighed, "I guess I should explain, then?"

"Yeah, that might be nice," Alec nodded.

"Okay," I took a deep breath. "Alec died during the fight against Behemoth, so just for completeness' sake, I think I should pick up the story there. So, to make a long, monumental clusterfuck of a story short, here's what happened..."

…

"...and then they made me their queen. That was last loop, though, so everything's back to normal now, only I've finally worked it out to where you guys can remember everything, which is great because I was going a little...crazy, without anyone to talk to."

There was a deafening silence, so total in it's emptiness of sound that I mentally checked whether or not I'd hit the 'mute' button on reality.

...I really wondered who had designed this interface.

Oh, wait. Reality interface...god damnit.

"Oh-okay," Lisa coughed, leaning down over the table to place her head in her hands. "I...Christ. Taylor...I don't even...you're telling us you're a goddess. Do you know how fucked up that sounds? How impossible? I'm not saying I don't believe you, but..."

I shrugged.

What could you say after explaining something like that.

I ordered my thoughts and tried. "To...well, not put too fine a point on it, but...you don't have to. Unless you ask me to rescind your privileges and stop you from remembering, you will believe me. Eventually."

What was it Alexandria had said, long long ago? Not a promise, not an oath, or a malediction or a curse. Inevitable. Wasn't that how she how she put it?

The universe had a sick sense of humor sometimes.

More silence.

"Well," Alec said suddenly, "That's cool, then. Who's up for pizza?"

"No," Brain declared. "Alec, you don't get to dismiss this like everything else. This is...I can't really understand how big this is, it's that big."

"So?" Alec shrugged. "Dork sounds like she's got it under control and we're basically immortal now. I don't know about you, but that's pretty awesome. Besides, there was this game I was half-way done with before Behemoth killed me, and I'd really like to finish it."

I couldn't help it.

The giggles started slowly, bubbling up from deep within and bursting forth in a sound so hysterical and mad, the Undersiders stiffened, each freezing in an instinctual reaction to something dangerous. After a few long minutes, I managed to get myself under control, slowing the laughter till it was merely a rumbling chuckle. Wiping tears from my eyes, I exhaled long and hard, an honest smile on my face for the first time in...years. A lot of years.

"Alec," I said, my tone much lighter, "never, ever change. Please."

Heartbreaker's son turned away, an uncomfortable expression on his face that some might have mistaken for a smile. As someone he might actually call a friend, I ignored it.

"I really needed that," I continued. "Wow, that felt good. Thanks."

"Well, now that we've discovered exactly how close our closeted hero is from completely bonkers," Tattletale said with a forced calm, trying to look as though she wasn't watching me closely. "What do we do now?"

"Whatever you want," I answered honestly. "I've picked up...a lot of hobbies. Some for fun, others for something to do, some...well, because nothing sticks around, some of my hobbies are a little...weird."

"Oh?" Aisha asked, raising an eyebrow. "Like what? Dating the Wards? I bet you've done pretty much everything," she commented with a salacious grin. "How many orgies?"

I rolled my eyes as Tattletale blanched. "Believe it or not? Sex does get boring...eventually, and I only tend to date when I really, really bored. But no, I was talking about things like studying science or painting or," I made an ambiguous motion with my hands. "You know."

"Taylor," Tattletale asked carefully, her posture wary, "You never said, but...how long have you been looping?"

I paused, then thought.

There was probably some setting in my interface that could tell me, but I honestly didn't want to get into that area without a lot more experience. "Long enough to understand Tinker-tech without it being a power?" I asked, frowning. "Long enough to paint a masterpiece copy of a Van Gogh and switch it out with a museum's original? Long enough to consider spray-painting the Simurgh a fun vacation?"

I think I'd stunned them again.

I shrugged, "Time-wise? I'm not really sure, not anymore at least. I lost count after a few hundred years...and that was...a long, long time ago."

"So...what do we do now?" Brian asked, though it didn't seem he was actually addressing anyone in particular.

"Well..." I considered. "I'm going to relax this loop, and probably answer a lot of questions, maybe kill Coil if he pushes it. He usually does." I thought for a moment. "Next loop I'm planning to join the Wards again and bring them and the junior members of New Wave into the loops. Then I'll probably let everyone run through a few loops with all their memories...after that I'll start randomizing them so that some of you will be awake and some won't. It'll make things a bit more interesting."

"Oh," Brian stated, nodding. "Okay...why? I mean, if you don't mind me asking?"

"I'm going to be...well, 'vacation' isn't quite right, but I'm going to be opting in to some fused loops and replacement loops in the greater Yggdrasil system so that I can get some more experience and have a bit of training as an Admin on the side." I explained further. "That means you'll probably be working around a prime loop iteration of myself without any extra memories or skills, but that won't be for at least a century. I want to give you guys some time to settle in at least."

"You want us to be anchors," Lisa said in realization.

The others stiffened in surprise.

"Kind of," I answered, slightly uncomfortable with the issue. "Our world...it doesn't work like the 'normal' loops because I'm actually administrating several...thousand? Million?...worlds without any sort of help. I get a little wiggle room because I'm not really 'mortal,' but if I'm not going to be around...so I want to make sure there are enough of you to maintain reality. If I only picked a few of you, the metaphysical weight would probably snap your psyches...by the time I got back, you'd be making the Slaughterhouse 9 look sane. By the way, this isn't me saying you have to, but I'd feel a lot better if I had some people to come back to, people that remember me, every time I get back from Yggdrasil."

"...what would we do?" Rachael asked, speaking for the first time, her gaze intent.

"Whatever you want," I repeated. "You can take care of your dogs...or try to conquer the world. Tattletale could figure out how to beat Dragon at chess...or just prank call Contessa for the next decade. Imp, you could deface the White House or master the electric guitar. Grue could meditate and gain enlightenment or...well, you get the idea."

"Wait," Alec grinned, "Do me too dork, make it a challenge."

I snorted. "How about trying to beat me at the body-snatching game? Or maybe form the world's largest conga line?"

Alec cracked his knuckles. "Okay, I'm impressed. Think I can get the Triumvarate in front?"

I grinned widely, reaching into my own personal pocket dimension and pulling out my digital photo album, tapping open a specific picture and sliding the hardened piece of tinker-tech over to my friend. "If I can do that? I'm pretty sure anything goes."

Alec's jaw dropped. "Is that...Eidolon and Bonesaw? How the Hell?"

Aisha took one loop at the picture and collapsed into helpless laughter.

Lisa twitched. "Why...is he wearing the dress?"

"I got bored. Besides, it was a beautiful ceremony. Very touching. I think I have the video on there too." Alec could not be stopped from opening and leafing through my photo album, leaving him howling on the floor with his girlfriend in short order. I luxuriated in the feeling of...well, not 'normalcy,' but it was certainly a lot closer to it than I'd been for a while.

...

I sighed as I pulled myself out of the simulation. I knew this was necessary, but it still hurt to be able to talk to them like that and then have the illusion ripped away. Still, the training was paying off. Lisa was looping with some regularity now. I was able to get Brain, too, every now and then. Alec and Rachael were very much hit or miss, sadly.

"So how'd I do?" I asked.

Skuld looked up from the pane of colored glass floating in front of her, a slight smile on her face. "Well, you didn't turn everyone into squid-people like last session."

I winced.

"But...you still messed up on a few of the minor fixes. It wasn't anything obvious, but the way you set up their loop memories is going to see some long-term interference with what you call 'passengers.' You wouldn't see it for a few millennia, but eventually they would turn into something similar to your 'Khepri.'"

I winced again, harder.

"Now, I'm going to assign you a little homework over the next course of your loops," Skuld continued. "I've uploaded it to your training guide. Remember to do them all in 'simulation mode.' You really don't want to start messing with reality at your level of experience. Safe Mode, like the loops, can only fix so much damage after all."

I sighed. Homework. I was a Goddess (kind of), and I still got homework.

Silently, I yearned for the halcyon days of my high school computer class.

At least then I didn't have to calculate multi-dimensional code in my head.

* * *

2.6 (Slayer Anderson)

Tattletale was Awake. She remembered.

I didn't consider that a bad thing, by itself. I was still working out the 'kinks' of how to get my friends 'looping' with me. Skuld and Mara had given me hints and pointers, but...

"Tattletale, are you sure about this? I mean..." Grue's voice came in clear through my bugs and I winced as Tattletale answered him.

"Grue, you weren't there. You didn't see what she did. She's some kind of adaptive trump that used a time-based power to come back and finish the job she started. We have to take her out now, before she starts developing her powers again," Lisa explained, her voice cold and harsh.

So, yes, I'd accomplished the goal of getting one of my friends 'looping.' The problem? She only remembered the prior loop...where I had tried on the evil overlord mantle again.

Tattletale had been one of the few to 'escape my grasp' and start up a rebellion. It had been a fun game of cat and mouse that provided years of entertainment.

Then she killed me in a wild gambit that took her life as well.

And now she was hell-bent on stopping me before I could topple my first local government and consolidate power.

"There she is!" A man cried through his radio. I winced, finding the sniper ensconced on a rooftop. One of Coil's men. Great.

Urd said there'd be loops like this.

* * *

2.7 (Inara Seraph)

I don't understand. Is this Scion's final gambit? Reset everything to the beginning, give himself another chance? But.. nobody else seems to remember. People would definitely remember the world ending. Scion is still in his saving people stage- if he was the one who reset things, wouldn't he immediately start his apocalypse? He could be biding his time. It's impossible to know right now.

My shard still bears Panacea's alterations, despite the fact that I've returned to my teenage self. I'm not sure how to feel about that. Even if I'd eventually succeeded in stopping Scion, it wasn't worth the damage I'd done. If I could've done something different, I would have.

I didn't expect to be able to make good on that promise.

The first thing I'd have to do is disappear. Even if I felt guilty leaving my dad behind all alone, the fate of the world took precedence.

I didn't make a plan, I just left. I wouldn't have been able to blend in as my past self anyway. It might've been preferable to fashion myself a costume- but I found I didn't care about secret identities as much anymore. I didn't need to hide behind a mask. I'd done without for years.

The second thing.. this was trickier. What was I concerned about back then? Coil was the first man I killed- but he doesn't matter, not in the grand scheme of things. Jack Slash was the man who instigated the apocalypse, but all the precogs of Cauldron showed that the apocalypse was going to happen sooner or later regardless. Killing him would only buy time.

But I needed time. Time to figure out just why the world had gone and reset on me. If this was a shard at work, it was some kind of fucking crazy-ass shard. All things considered, I wasn't.. unhappy, with the way things had turned out, when you consider what I'd had to work with. I may have regretted things, but I could deal with the fallout. After all, things could've gone so much worse.

In round two, all bets were off. The world could end quicker than it did last time.

Despite myself, I felt a small inkling of.. anticipation. The chance to save the world again. I'd been lost once everything was over. I would never do anything half as grand as what I'd already done. Not so, not anymore.

Time to go hunting the hunters.

* * *

1.11 cont (Rex)

In the Library:

Subject: Re:Bug

See you at three. I'll bring a friend.

I smiled. The first alteration this loop to the usual introductory chat message. Time to log off and head over. I do wonder what dear Tattletale's reaction will be. My loop experience and mental training helped make me mostly immune to Tattletale's powers when I knew what to expect, though most of the time I only used it to prevent her from figuring out stuff about the loops. That was a long and difficult conversation I had had far to many times.

Subject: Re:Bug

Wait, what?

Oh, this was fun. So rare to get that out of Tattletale. I debated teasing her further by asking to move the meeting point to the Underloft, but decided against it. So I simply posted a smiley face and logged off. Now I just needed to grab Simu- I mean, Sam, and head over.

I froze. Crap, I had selected this internet café using the Zion anti-precog protocalls. I don't think Sam had a phone number, and if she did I didn't know it. This wouldn't make a good first impression on the group. I thought hard for a minute before realizing the obvious solution. The next time I meet Sam, I would tell her that she should meet me in this café on this day at, I checked my phone, 12:05.

"I have acquired a cell phone since our last meeting." I looked up into Sam's eyes. Well, into Sam's shades. She was wearing dark glasses and holding a straight white cane. She was dressed in tight blue jeans, a canary yellow shirt and a red jacket.

"You're pretending to be blind?" I asked quietly as we walked out of the Library.

"I am blind." She responded as we continued on our way. She didn't do a very good job acting the part I thought. Her steps were entirely to confident. "I will be telling them that my precog and other extra-sensory abilities remove many of the difficulties of my disability. Tell me to meet you." The last was a spoken in a very terse voice.

"I need you to meet me at the internet café on third street on April 12th at 12:05." I didn't expect her to seem so upset about it. It isn't like me not telling her would have been that much of a temporal paradox.

At the meeting:

I went in costume to the meeting, as did Sam. Although her idea of a costume was to take the silk bandana I had given her, apply a bit of dye to give it an outline of a set of eyes, and split her walking cane into a pair of Escrima fighting sticks. Since she was supposed to be new and not exactly a frontline fighter, I figured it was good enough until I managed to finish her outfit. With a much larger range and much greater experience, I could finish a basic outfit within a day or so. We climbed up to my second favorite rooftop in Brockton.

"And she arrives," Tattletale crowed, "Pay up."

Regent's scowl deepened for a second, and he fished in his pocket for a wad of bills, which he forked over to Tattletale.

"You bet on whether I would show up?" I filled in my line.

"We bet on whether you would come in costume," Tattletale told me. Then, more to Regent than to me, she said, "and I won."

"Again," Regent muttered.

My partner made a slight coughing noise. I reached into my pocket and handed her a dollar coin.

"Remind me why I ever bet against you?" I asked with false annoyance.

"Because I give you 100 to 1 odds in your favor?" Sam replied with faked smug satisfaction.

"You bet on who would win our bet?" Regent asked, clearly confused.

"On what the bet was." I replied. "If it had been on anything besides costumes it would have counted as my win." I snorted. "Precogs."

After that little bit of theater, Sam's introduction went well. She was introduced as the person who had said I would be able to stop a gang war if I went to where Lung was last night. Brian was a bit hesitant, but Tattletale and Regent convinced him that more members and more information gathering ability was for the best.

It was time to go to the loft. I loved the loft!

* * *

2.8 (RedshirtZombie)

"So, Leviathan versus Godzilla - who would win?"

It was a 'game' the Undersiders had developed - with Skitter's quasi-looping to provide data, and Tattletale's analysis abilities, the facts coud be crunched out to define a result more certain than casual nerd flaming. However, it didn't always work out.

"I can't call in loopers with their normal abilities, remember?"

Tattletale blinked, and stared at Skitter. "No, no, not as in 'let Godzilla in for a loop - that wasn't what you meant. Okay, explain."

"Apparently, one of the loopers can somehow call him into local reality. And only him."

"Godzilla? There's a summon for that," said Regent.

"Really, sis?" said Glory Girl, staring at Panacea, and her new 'pet'.

"Well, I was going to wait for a chance to make it follow Cauldron members around, but it makes a good shoulder warmer for now."

"You do know that being videotaped with that will damage New Wave's rep, right? Not to mention the legal issues."

"True, but I intend to have it elsewhere when that happens," Panacea said as she offered the psuedo-Incubator a treat. "After all, not every gift is nice."

Elsewhere in the world, Scion sneezed. Its latest attempt at understanding humanity concluded and failed, it promptly went to look for its human.

* * *

2.9 (sasahara17)

"Are you guys sure about this? We're pranking Taylor. TAYLOR."

"So? We do it to each other all the time. Why shouldn't she get pranked once or twice, especially in a Vanilla loop as boring as this one?"

"Yes, but… you do remember there was a time when everyone was shit scared of crossing her right? Rule number 1 of Worm Loops, 'Never cross Taylor Hebert'?"

"Of course! I'd never forget Rule 1. In fact, all we're doing is letting other people know about it!"

"Yes but…"

"I'm just saying Taylor's a memetic badass no matter what she does. It's part of who she is. Once she gets going, sooner or later everyone is going to know her name. All we're doing is giving her a little head start in building this reputation in this loop."

"Yes, but…"

"Grue, Grue, Grue… listen to me. Even Lung and Contessa agreed with the plan. Hell, THE Simurgh was the one who came up with it! Everyone must learn to fear the Hebert. Half the problems in Brockton, hell half the problems on Earth BET, could be avoided if people just learned to leave her well enough alone."

"…you do realize her inevitable revenge prank for this will totally make us all wish we were never born, right?"

"Totally. Now are we doing this thing or not?"

When the Undersiders showed up in force at the PRT HQ, nobody knew what was going to happen next. The notorious, yet elusive, gang of teenage super-villains were famous for being smart, savvy, and never being one to pick a fight they couldn't win. If they dared march up to the headquarters of the very organization that was hunting them like this in broad daylight, their either were very stupid, or they had something up their sleeves.

Considering that these kids were supposed to be pretty damn smart and Piggot wasn't an optimist, she figured she'd act as if the latter was the case until proven otherwise. So, even though the teenage super-villain team had been completely surrounded by everything on site and then some, the mean and women of the PRT were still waiting for the other shoe to drop.

And it did, with a simple statement.

"We're turning ourselves in. We have discussed the matter among ourselves in great, and have decided that we want to reform ourselves and become heroes!" Tattletale announced.

"It was either that or Bees." Regent quipped.

Safe to say, Tattletale and Regent's declarations were so outrageous that no one could come up with a reply. After a few moments making sure that no one

"We have seen the error of our ways," Tattletale clarified, "Queen of the Swarm, Taylor Hebert, has shown us the path of justice and righteousness..."

"By scaring us straight with Bees," Regent interrupted helpfully, "Don't mess with bees."

"They were hornets. Japanese Giant Hornets in fact," Grue corrected his friend in a manner of fact tone. "Thirty to forty people die every year from Giant Hornet Stings, so they're much more dangerous that mere bees."

"Details, details. They're flying insects with stingers that come at you in a swarm. Same concept."

"AS I WAS SAYING before I was rudely interrupted," Tattletale said sharply to shut up the sideshow, before turning back to address the PRT, "A superheroine named Taylor Hebert stormed our base last night, sat us all down while covering us in Black Widows, and convinced us to turn over a new leaf. Or else Bees. So here we are."

The general consensus of the crowd's reaction could be pretty much summed up under a single word.

"What." Piggot accidentally said into her megaphone, broadcasting her surprise to everyone in earshot.

Fortunately for her, Piggot wasn't the only one taken off guard by the sudden twist. Around her, fellow PRT agents and the few members of the Wards that had been hastily summoned as reinforcements are muttering among themselves in confusion, trying to make sense of what was happening.

"What, Hebert? How…" Stalker began, but eventually stopped when all words failed her.

"Taylor Hebert? Well this explains everything. Yep, this has her fingerprints all over it all right," Clockblocker shrugged in a manner of fatly. "Figured she'd pull something like this."

"Yeah. Threatened them into submission. That's her M.O. all right." Kid Win nodded in agreement.

"You two know this Taylor?" Aegis asked his teammates.

"Of course! You don't?" Clockblocker raised a skeptical eyebrow at his teammates. "Taylor Motherfucking Hebert the deadliest motherfucker on the Bay. Even Lung is scared of her!"

"Geez, guys, we're Wards. Were supposed to know about this kind of stuff." Kid Win tsked.

"This is a joke right? This has to be a joke." Vista mumbled to herself, watching the Undersiders helpfully and willingly submitted themselves to PRT officers, who looked about as awkward as they felt.

And that was then the call about the Anz Bad Boys came in…

Defiant, well Armsmaster at the moment, had to actually stop himself rolling his eyes as the other members of the Protectorate ran around the smoldering ruin that used to be a warehouse. While this would normally be the concern of the fire department, said warehouse also used to belong to the notorious criminal gang, the Azn Bad Boys, and used to be stocked to the brim with contraband.

Dozens of law enforcement and emergency vehicles surrounded the area as police and paramedics rushed in to deal with this disaster. Surprisingly, aside from three casualties, no one was actually hurt – from what reports from the members of the gang who had been unable to flee the scene before the authorities showed up in force had told paramedics someone a sent giant spider robots with, among other things, stun guns to storm the building. The parahuman members of the gang were incapacitated almost right off the bat, and by the time they came to it was all they could do but to flee the scene before the building collapsed into flames.

The culpurit?

"I, Taylor Hebert, have brought down justice upon the Azn Bad Boys and have slain the villains known as Lung, Oni Lee and Bakuda. To all evildoers of Brockton Bay, fear me!" Miss Militia read the letter that had been left behind in the wreckage aloud. "Well, she's not subtle, that's for sure."

"She never is. That girl always leaves behind a trail of destruction wherever she goes." Colin sighed offhandedly as he picked his way through the wreckage. To those not in the know, he would have looked like he was searching for evidence that would be used in the ensuing investigation.

In truth, he was just making sure that Dragon's new 'spider bots' didn't leave anything behind that would give away the deception. His girlfriend was good, but she literally threw those spider bots together in twenty four hours and might have made an error in her haste. So far so good though.

"You know this Hebert?" Miss Militia said, clearly surprised.

…Which was an understandable sentiment, since up until yesterday, Taylor Hebert was just an ordinary girl with crippling self-esteem issues. Now? Now she was an looping anchor that really needed her comeuppance after all the times she'd poked fun at his relationship with Dragon!

"From what Dragon's told me, she's one of the smartest people on the planet," Colin explained in his entirely too serious, manner of fact tone, "With an intellect like that, there is are very few who can match her wit."

"So those spider bots were hers?"

"Taylor Hebert does seem to employ an insect motif," Colin shrugged, allowing his friend to draw her own conclusions. "Did you find Lung or his lieutenants?"

Miss Militia shook her head sadly. "Oni Lee is injured, currently in our custody, while Bakuda is currently in intensive care at Brockton Bay General and is in a vegetative state. As for Lung… the biggest part we found of Lung was his arm. He's missing, presumed… dead."

Looks like Lung pulled off his part successfully then, faking his own demise while incapacitating both Oni Lee and Bakuda. Seems like he took down Bakuda a lot harder than he did Oni Lee though.

"While I have no love for criminals and murderers, we're going to have to take Miss Hebert in for questioning," Colin declared. "Vigilante behavior like this can't be tolerated. We'll have to storm her house before she knows we're coming."

"…are you sure about this?" The uncertainty and fear in Miss Milita's voice was very clear. "Whoever this is, she took down Lung and the rest of the Azn Bad Boys, by herself… in one night no less. Perhaps we should… talk to her first?"

Colin really had to stop the urge to laugh. The plan was working already.

* * *

2.7 cont (Inara Seraph)

For a group that cheerfully takes part in mass murder and has whole alerts and evacuation procedures dedicated to them, the Slaughterhouse Nine were remarkably slippery. Jack had, somehow, been able to figure out that something dangerous was on his trail. He still had to engage his the usual shenanigans to keep his group happy- but his attacks were looking more and more like hit and runs.

If I hadn't already been inured to the sight of human suffering, seeing the remains of whatever town they visited would've shocked me. It only spurred me on harder. In the planning phase I'd been focused on all the deaths from the apocalypse, but I'd momentarily forgotten that Jack was a blight on human civilization regardless. Nobody would be sad to see him gone.

I finally had to accept I wasn't going to catch them by myself- I needed to recruit some help. To that end, I visited the nearest city and 'borrowed' a couple precogs. Neither was all that powerful, not even close to what Dinah could do, but they would be enough to forecast the next S9 attack if I used them in tandem.. so I hoped.

I caught my break, plugged into the news-feeds and desperately wishing I had access to Protectorate resources, and sprung into action, leaving the bewildered thinkers behind. For the actual take-down, I needed no help. My powers were anti-S-class personnel weapons of the highest order. My range was still annoyingly small, but I could work around that.

I put something else on my list. I needed to visit Panacea. I should've done it before I left Brockton Bay, but it was too late now. She would never modify my brain willingly- she only did it the first time around under threat of apocalypse, but I could just force her to do it. I had the feeling her first modification that let to my current incarnation of powers was something of a rush job anyway- if I gave her another, fresh look she might be able to make improvements.

In the midst of a killing spree, finding the Slaugherhouse Nine was as simple as following the bodies. Crawler was smashing buildings, crushing anyone unfortunate enough to still be aside, Mannequin was hunting down any stragglers, but I couldn't spot any of the others out in the open.

I waited. They would congregate before they left, and that's when I would strike. It was unfortunate that so many would die in the interim, but I would save more lives in the long run by biding my time. When everything was finished, I followed after Crawler.

They met on a remote highway near a parked van. My approach became immediately obvious once I was forced to follow in the open. Crawler gleefully ran forward to smash me to pieces, and I raised a hand to stop him.

He stopped.

Then he turned around, and advanced on his comrades. I followed behind him into range, ensnaring Mannequin next and leaving him prone for Crawler to decimate. I had Crawler destroy every little piece of him so that nothing remained.

I didn't need Crawler anymore. With him serving as my vanguard, I captured everyone- Bonesaw, Jack, Shatterbird, Siberian, Burnscar.. Hatchet Face? Wasn't he the one who disrupted powers? In that case.. oh, dear.

"Well, that was a close one," Jack commented.

I staggered back a couple steps, eyes wide in horror. Stupid, stupid, stupid. I'm so stupid. Cherish doesn't join until later. My eyes darted left and right, desperately hoping for an escape route to present itself.

Jack scrutinized me from where stood some twenty feet in front of me. He seemed to be puzzling over something. Bonesaw glared at me from his side, and the other members were content to wait for Jack's lead.

Finally, he shrugged. "Normally, I'd congratulate you on such an efficient kill- but I can see that you wouldn't fit in our merry band of misfits." He glanced at Bonesaw. "You have something in mind for her?"

Bonesaw nodded enthusiastically. Then she frowned. "She killed Manny. How'd she kill Manny?" She looked at me speculatively. "I can't wait to find out!"

An ominous premonition led me to hastily extract a knife from my pocket. I drew it across my throat, desperately hoping to die before Bonesaw could interfere. I collapsed to the ground in a heap.

Through my rapidly fading consciousness, I could hear cheerful words coming as if from far away. "Ah, ah, ah! You're not allowed to die until I say so!"

* * *

1.11 cont (Rex)

At home:

"Did you know that your new friend is a sociopath that's faking her emotions based on what her precog says gives the best results?" Lisa asked me in a whisper.

"Did you know that Regent is a sociopath that's faking his emotions based on what he thinks the response of a normal person should be?" I whispered back. Lisa's eyebrows rose in surprise. "Sam told me. She also assured me that she would develop actual emotional depth over the course of our acquaintance, and that Regent would as well. Though I'm not sure if she was actually telling the truth about that."

"She believes she was." Lisa replied as she examined Sam and Regent playing some sort of cooperative shooting game on the couch. "Two recovering sociopaths on a couch. You could make a tv show." I paused for a moment, considering how well the two of them had been getting along and the possible plotlines for such a show. Note to self: see about making an Endbringer reality show at some point. In the meantime…

"We must insure that they never breed. The results would be to disturbing to allow."

On the job:

I finished my speech about the properties of the black widow spider. With how many times I had robbed this bank before, I could stretch my introductory monologue to cover the entirety of the event. However, this time I kept it short and sweet.

As soon as I finished, Sam, or rather, Delphi since she was in costume, marched over to a brown hair customer and pulled her to her feet. I wasn't sure why she was grabbing Panacea, but would gladly avoid the nausea caused by her interference. I removed all the bugs I had allowed to touch her skin.

"Impromtu therapy session for the sake of the future, coming through." She announced as she guided Amy into a backroom. I rolled my eyes and followed her after making sure the rest of my charges knew I could still sense them even if I wasn't in the room. I could talk Amy through most of her issues with me in a single sitting, at least enough to get her to agree to a second, more clandestine, meeting. This would be the first time I'd done it with such a rough introduction though.

Let's see, avoiding Tattletale's attack on Amy's sanity, made sure Dinah was attending the Protectorate event outside of town. Make sure to avoid traumatizing any of the Wards and almost all of the negative repercussions of the Bank attack would be avoided. As annoying as it could be at times, being in an endless loop was certainly useful for this sort of thing. I was like a super Coil, infinite chances to get things right. Ooh, note that idea down for a later cycle. Replace Coil without anyone noticing, that should take awhile to do correctly.

* * *

2.10 (Gideon_NZ)

Some of the Many Deaths of Taylor Hebert

or "How Taylor learned to always dodge left"

Lung:

I saw Lung prepare to send a burst of flame towards the roof and I dodged right.

- and was incinerated in a burst of unbelievable pain. Of course the physical pain was nothing compared to the embarrassment and frustration I felt falling at the first hurdle. I was better than this! Note to self: Next time, dodge left.

Dogs:

Rachel stormed up to the top floor of the loft, whistling to her dogs. I was ready this time around and dodged the first lunge. But Rachel had more than one dog and when the second one slowed me down, the first grabbed my arm from behind and started shaking.

"Oh, Shit!" shouted Lisa.

I looked down at the rapidly spreading red stain. Already it covered half of my chest. I guess the dog must have hit an artery. Note to self: Next time dodge left! It took a few seconds for Lisa to convince Rachel to call off her dogs. I slumped to the floor. Maybe I should learn the whistles Rachel used to control her dogs? That sounded useful. Lisa did what she could but I had lost too much blood. Better luck next time Lisa.

Merchants:

I jumped up onto the stage to grab Charlotte and save her from the crowd and only then remembered that I had originally followed Lisa's plan and used one of the soldiers to grab her. I froze, but it wasn't enough. The front lines of the crowd saw what I was trying to do and screamed their anger and bloodlust. I tried to scramble back but the crowd was on all sides of the stage. Note to self: dodging left doesn't help if you are surrounded. I heard a gunshot but I wasn't lucky enough to be fatally wounded. As I was slowly beaten to death by the crowd (well it felt slow at the time!) I had time to regret the reduced self preservation instincts and impatience that I was picking up over my many recent deaths.

Shadow Stalker:

I tracked Shadow Stalker through my swarm as I led her towards the ambush location where the rest of the undersiders waited. I had to be careful not to let too many bugs pass through her shadow form but if I used mostly lighter bugs I could still tell where she was by the slight disturbance in the air currents as she passed nearby. I stopped near the electrified fence and pretended to be looking through my bag of loot. Sophia noticed the fence at the last moment and adjusted her trajectory, turning her tackle into a clumsy collision. I let her pin me beneath her and looked up at her as she drew a sharpened bolt. "So how does it feel to know you are about to die alone, like a bitch, Bug girl?" She asked.

"Look behind you and ask again" I said. She sneered at me but then started when Regents voice rang out.

"Yeah, ya shoulda looked." He drawled as he approached with his taser at the ready. Just as he reached out Sophia flung her left hand out like she was throwing a knife.

"Dodge left, Regent!" I shouted. But it was a fake out, and Sophia used the opportunity to phase the bolt in her right hand through the neck of my costume and into my throat.

As I choked on my own blood I made a note to bring more bees next time. And teach Regent to dodge left.

Coil:

"And this is Skitter." Lisa said

I looked over to Coil as his attention turned towards me. He calmly drew his pistol. I tried to dodge left but Grue was a solid weight I couldn't move. I started to turn right but Coil shot me between the eyes.

Huh, I guess he did bother to ask Dinah about me that morning.

It hurt like a bitch too, like being head butted by Glory Girl, but my mask held. I had the feeling he was raising an eyebrow behind his mask.

"Finish her" he said to someone behind me.

I was still reeling from the first shot so any dodging was out of the question and I had left a gap in the back of my mask for my hair. I heard a truncated bang.

Alexandria:

I stared at her hatefully as she outlined her ultimatum. Tragg smirked at me from behind her back. I decided to try something new.

"Hey Quinn?" I said to my lawyer. You are recording this right, like I asked?"

"Yes Taylor" he replied.

I turned back to Alexandria. So who wants to hear the inside scoop on Cauldron? It all started when Contessa and Doctor Mother…"

I learned that death comes pretty quick when Alexandria puts her fist through your skull.

Tragg:

"Aaarrrggh!" I screamed. For some reason my anger seemed closer to the surface this loop and I finally had an acceptable target. I concentrated most of my attention on Alexandria as the larger threat but I still sent enough black widows and other spiders at Tragg to ruin his forever. I was shoving more spiders down Alexandria's throat when I noticed Tragg's gun was pointed right at me. Hadn't my shard handled tying his gun down with silk this time around? Maybe my own shard was working against me!

I dived right but the shackles brought me up short and Tragg took the shot. I kinda admired how steady his hand was while spiders infested his eyes and other orifices but it was still frustrating to have to start again because he blew my brain all over the fancy suit of my lawyer. Note to self: dodge left and supervise my shard more closely.

S9:

I looked at Riley treating the wounded. It wasn't her fault but every time I looked at her I remembered. I remembered so many times when Jack had outsmarted me, or I made some tiny mistake and she had tortured me far beyond the point of death. I turned away and focused again on building my army. At least the S9 didn't catch me so often now that I had learned to always dodge left.

* * *

2.11 (Auks)

It was, Aisha reflected, going to be one of those loops.

"The Protectorate Field Headquarters offshore of Brockton Bay, was attacked and captured by next generation Mercenaries being led by members of the Undersiders. They're demanding that the government recognize their sovereignty over Brockton Bay and they say if their demands are not met within 24 hours they'll launch a nuclear weapon."

"You'll have two mission objectives:"

"First, your to rescue PRT Director James Tagg and the President of Faceti Glenn Chambers. Both are being held as hostages."

"Secondly, you're to investigate whether or not the terrorists have the ability to make a nuclear strike, and stop them if they do."

"You know Leet, I have no idea whatever it is your referencing."

On the other end of the microphone, Leet sputtered. "Oh, come on. This is Metal Gear Solid! It's a classic! Tactical Steath action! It's like- like-"

"Something I've never played?"

"GAHHHHH!"

After waiting a few minutes for the sputtering to die down, Aisha asked the obvious question. "How are you going to get me there anyway?"

Well, We'll approach the Platform by sub-"

Yeah, I kind of noticed that part. What happens after that?"

"We'll launch a one-man SDV"

"A what?"

"A Swimmer Delivery Vehicle."

"I still don't know what that is."

"Look, just open the little door on your left and climb in."

"You know, this looks a lot like a torpedo tube. Are you planning to shoot me out of a torpedo?"

"It's an SDV! It's perfectly safe. Anyway, after the SDV gets as close as it can, dispose of it. From there on, you'll have to swim."

"Uh, that's going to kind of be a problem. I don't really know how to swim."

"GAHHHH!"

Definitely going to be one of those loops. Why did she have to lose that bet with Uber? She could have been on the Oil Rig with the rest of the Undersiders but nooooo.

Stupid bet.

* * *

2.12 (Inara Seraph)

I laid on my bed, staring at the ceiling in the late hours of the evening. I'd been forced to do a bit of a reevaluation of.. everything, in the time I'd spent under Bonesaw's 'care' and the couple days in this new world since I looped again. And wasn't that mind-boggling- as soon as I truly died, I came back right to the beginning, again. Was this purgatory or some kind of bizarre afterlife?

Back in my original world- and I couldn't help but see these two additional worlds as simply very good copies- Khepri had been a globally feared supervillain on par with Endbringers. I could enslave entire nations. I put the S9 to shame. I must've bought into my own hype a little too much.

Because it was a rush job that had led to my demise- I was too focused on the overarching plan, and not enough on the immediate goal. I had viewed the S9 as a mere speed-bump on the way to victory. The S9 were a bit more than a speed-bump, and I should know. I definitely wouldn't forget it now.

I used to pride myself on preparing for every possible contingency and then a few that should've been impossible. Now that I was 'Taylor Hebert' again I thought it was about time I returned to being.. crafty. Yes, my powers lent themselves to overwhelming force- but I could use it in other ways as well.

I said goodbye to my dad-clone and marched off to school.. or rather, to the interstate bus route. I had a good memory for the trail I had followed last time- and if they took the same path again, I would be able to track down the S9 faster than I did last time.

I just needed to make a few.. preparations, first.

–

I stood sentinel in the desert with my teleporter minion's hand grasped in mine. On his other side was a young clairvoyant girl I'd stumbled upon by chance. We were in rural Iowa, what most would call 'The Middle of Nowhere.' I saw a town far, far on the horizon. It was only visible because the land was so flat. I stayed a safe distance away.

I had a tinker device in my other hand. If I'd learned anything as a cape, it was that a Tinker that was fully prepared for you was the worst possible enemy anyone could face. In this case, I was extra-prepared- I knew where the S9 would strike before they did. I hoped that my preparations had been stealthy enough not to tip Jack off.

The clairvoyant's heartbeat sped up. Something was happening- I looked where she was looking, and I could see what she saw. The S9 had arrived- Shatterbird was singing her song. Once I counted everyone- Jack, Hatchet, Burnscar, Mannequin, Siberian, Bonesaw, Shatterbird, Crawler- I pressed the Big Red Button.

The town exploded.

Bakuda was an insane bitch, but she knew how to make a bomb. The mushroom cloud expanded high into the sky, and I could feel the wind pick up even where we stood miles away. There would be no radiation from the blast, but the town that was there would have to be erased from the maps, because it was simply gone once the smoke cleared.

Was this the best method? Probably not. The best method would have me know that they're all dead. The problem was that I didn't want to go anywhere near them if I had to. I was completely sure Crawler would survive the blast, and Mannequin might even be able to, but the rest would have no chance. Whatever safeguards Bonesaw had in place didn't protect against complete annihilation.

I high-fived my minions. It was awkward because I was the one manipulating both parts of the gesture, but I felt like doing it anyway. They were really boring to be around if I didn't make them emulate actual people a little bit.

In the spirit of caution, I would assume every single one of them survived the blast somehow. I would keep my ear out for further S9 sightings, just in case. Still, I was happy. I could move on to more important things now. It was time to go back home- I needed a portal to another dimension, and I knew just how to make one.

* * *

1.11 cont (Rex)

"You sure I should call him here? I could send him elsewhere." Sam asked as we reclined on the roof of what usually became my supervillain lair. It had such beautiful sunsets. "I can not stop him from attacking somewhere, but I can steer him well away from us."

"Call him up, that Protectorate base really spoils my view." A blank look. I think it was supposed to be disapproving. "Joking, joking. But I've done loops without a Leviathan attack, they're usually even more difficult."

"Endbringer attacks after my arrival were arranged for the highest probability of continuation after what you know as Golden Morning." Sam shrugged. "In addition to your own contributions, Leviathan provided crucial distraction against the enemy. The placement of Foil and Golem were also important, but those can be accomplished with other methods."

"You're the reason none of my ideas to kill Leviathan never worked, aren't you?" A nod from my friend. "Even when I managed to get the Golden Git to show up early and then not interfere Leviathan escaped in some way that I hadn't managed to close off or just went somewhere else." Dammit. And I had worked so hard on most of those ideas. I figured that the Simurgh had been protecting the other Endbringers from me when they deviated from previous patterns without basis of any current action on my part, but I hadn't thought her efforts went quite so far. "I already made my decision, and you aren't being persuasive enough to change my mind. What's the point of this conversation?"

"You just declared the target of the next Endbringer attack. You have been able to do it for a long time now, all I have done is cut out the middle man. You know this city is going to be wrecked, and hundreds are going to die and you do not care." She pointlessly turned her head to look in my direction. Guilt? Was that her angle? To try and make me feel guilty for the Endbringers, for what happens in a single loop?

Of course I didn't care. Why would I? They would all be fine next loop, in the same danger, leaving me with the same choices. I hadn't managed to prevent every human death in a loop, but I came damn close. Zion dealt with before his rampage, Slaughterhouse 9 slain or imprisoned, Cauldron defused, Dragon unchained, Panacea working to her full capacity, Eidolon dead and the Endbringers in dormancy. Humanity was entering a golden age, space travel was looking very viable, we had hundreds of dimensions to expand across, aging wasn't a problem, everyone had a healing factor, there was no war and little crime, everything was as perfect as I could possibly imagine. And it didn't matter even a little bit. I hit the time limit, and I woke up in a filth filled locker. I had gone mad, killed and hurt so many people, finally been put down like a dog. It hadn't mattered either. That was so very long ago. And no one could remember it except me. All the ones that lived when I saved them, or died when I killed them. They were back exactly the way they were within a few years. So why would I care? How could I manage to love anything which never changed?

I'm sorry.

A voice, a memory. Not mine. She was in my brain. My shields slammed up and I swung to face her.

She was small, and crouched over. Curled up in a tiny ball. Turned away from me to stare out at the city. "I find myself preferring that the subjects of this city remain alive despite the increased difficulty of the scenario with that provision. You are fond of many of the subjects in question and you are the person most similar to myself. I wanted to know how you dealt with it."

"And?"

"You are not."

I snorted. This was pathetic. The Simurgh was one of my biggest obstacles over the loops. I'm not sure why I thought I could fool myself into being friends with her. It's all just a big mind game to make sure I don't mess up the rest of her plans. Fine, I could play too. I was older, more experienced, and had plenty of tricks she'd never have had a chance to see. I just use them based off of Zion, and it'd be simple enough to deal with her. It'd worked before and it'd work again. And if I was losing, well it wouldn't be the first time I killed myself.

"Leviathan, May 15th. It might be best if you didn't show up to that pre-fight meeting, considering the number of your enemies that will be present." I hop off the roof and slide down the water pipe on the side. It'd taken me years to get that trick down, but it was so terribly convenient. I stalked off, ignoring the rattle of the Simurgh's clumsy attempts to follow after me. I pulled out my cell phone and checked my Zion app. Couldn't let her know where I was going to sleep tonight.

Dammit, and I had been having such a good time.

* * *

2.13 (Inara Seraph)

I reach out to my hive. It's wondrous how they move and how they operate. Controlled chaos, that's how I would describe it. There's so much activity, from the lowest drone to the massive star-base I'm currently residing in. So many- and yet each of them hold a place in my mind.

It's amazing. I would do anything to make this loop last forever. I know it will end eventually.. but I fully intend to bask in the harmony of the Borg for as long as possible. I couldn't have asked for a better vacation loop.

..My well-developed sense of paranoia kicks in. Something will go wrong, I just know it- and the first candidate for suspicion is the possibility that I'm not the only one Awake here. I'm not even close to the oldest looper around, and if there are other loopers here.. I'll have to be extra-wary. I am, after all, on the side of the boogeymen of this universe.

I'd taken to soliciting information from other loopers whenever I got the chance to learn more about loopers they'd encountered. A random anecdote could very well end up saving me a lot of grief down the road.

I run my augmented arm down the length of a wall-panel. I was already considering what technology I could bring back home with me. The only real roadblocks were some of the more esoteric materials that might not even exist on my Earth. Still, I should be able to make it work. There are so few things left for me to do in my home universe, but exploring space- that's something I haven't done yet.

I stop. There's a tinny staccato noise coming from somewhere behind me. I turn to face it, and there's a flash of light. A man dressed in a Starfleet uniform appears in front of me. It's command red, with four pips to denote Captain rank. Before I can open my mouth to question him, he starts talking.

"First of all, and I'd like to get this out of the way because I know it's going to bug some of the people out there, when we say the Q are omnipotent, we're lying." He spoke in a playful tone of voice, one that suggested that he was perpetually laughing at a joke only he knew.

I tilt my head curiously. Information on the elusive 'Q' flows into my consciousness from the relevant databases. This one in particular had frequented the Federation multiple times previously. "To whom are you referring?" I ask.

"Nobody, my dear, nobody. As I was saying- I can't do anything about these loops. I do happen to know the details of what's going on- more than my other Q associates, at any rate, but I'm powerless to do anything about it," he explains.

I blink slowly. The information is completely unsolicited and out of nowhere, but it's not the strangest thing that's ever happened to me. "I.. see. Well, I can't say I'm disappointed. I don't expect the universe to do me any favors."

He gives me an uncomfortably scrutinizing look. "Wow, you're gloomy. What universe are you from again?"

"Uh-" I begin, only to be interrupted.

"Ohhh, that one. Hah!" He lets out a short bark of laughter. I narrow my eyes at him, wondering if some sort of insult is implied.

He clears his throat. "Anyways. For us, this is really just business as usual. Time as you mortals understand it doesn't exist for the Q. When the loops finally end, we'll be exactly the same as we were when they started." The last sentence is spoken with a barely detectable hint of bitterness.

"I'm.. sorry?" I end my words on a questioning lilt.

He waves off my apology. "No, no, no need to apologize. It's why I like watching you humans skitter about."

I consider asking him more about the loops. I want that information desperately.. but I'm not confident at all about the trustworthiness of the being in front of me. Everything about him screams that he's a trickster- any information from him has a very good chance of being misleading or outright false.

He doesn't appear inclined to stay any longer than necessary. He most likely came here with a specific purpose in mind, and now that it's finished, he's going to leave. I know that if he can appear in the heart of Borg space undetected, there's nothing I can do to keep him here. I resign myself to silence.

If anything, his smile widens. "Well, go on then! Assimilate the universe or whatever it is you do. Ta-ta!" He waves goodbye, then disappears in a blink of light.

That was very strange. I put it in the back of my mind. It wasn't something I could figure out without more information. I would devote some drones to figuring it out, but I would focus the majority of my attention elsewhere.

Something he said comes back to me. Assimilate the universe.. that sounds like fun, actually.

I smile.

* * *

1.11 cont (Rex)

Apology:

"That's a lot of tea."

"I need to enhance my current social standing in regards to Taylor Hebert. I believe that if I rely on my precognitive abilities to do so that any gains will be temporary and substandard."

"Someone finally noticed how much you use your powers to manipulate them, huh?"

"You will not be able to get the reactions your power needs by insulting me Tattletale. The restrictions I have applied to myself apply only to Taylor for the subject of reconciliation. Also, I have been working to minimize the amount of manipulation that I perform in regards to our team. We had a rather long talk about it in a scenario where I selected long term gains that carried the cost of short term losses to an unacceptable degree."

"Fine, so what's with all the tea?"

"Subject displays responses that correlate with pleasure when consuming this category of beverage. I, uh, I need you to figure out which one is her favorite. I have never bought tea before. I did not realize that there would be so many flavors."

"Taylor seemed really angry about whatever it is you guys fought about. Do you really think that a couple of cups of tea is going to be a big enough apology?"

"You are aware of my difficulties with experiencing and understanding emotions. Is this gesture insufficient?"

"It's an okay start, but you are probably going to need to come up with some alternatives."

"… Do you think that consulting Dinah Alcott would count as cheating?"

"What are you doing?" A slurred voice, stopped from being suspicious only by dint of its grogginess. I looked over at the blond girl standing at the door way of the kitchen.

"Just throwing out some tea. I think it's past its expiration date." It was disturbingly easy to talk my way into spending a few nights at Missy Biron's house. A girl lost and alone after dark, enough for one night if she clams up and doesn't talk about her situation. Respect towards Missy and a willingness to help around the house, friendly relations. A quick wave of the hand and some muttered words while Vista is in the bathroom, a standing parental invite and a mother that isn't so depressive for a day or so. The force truly was a useful tool, even if I did struggle with being a grey Jedi rather than sliding towards the extremes.

… Was I being to dismissive of other people? Casual manipulation like what I had done to the Biron's would have disgusted me in my first life. The idea of it happening to me or one of the other Anchors still filled me with revulsion. At some point I had stopped treating the people around me as thinking, feeling beings rather than a series of inputs and outputs to be maneuvered as I desired. It wouldn't do me any good to get emotionally invested in the development of a non-looper, it would simply go away to quickly. But perhaps

"You're doing that thing again." Missy's broke through my musings. She strode over to the refrigerator and grabbed the milk carton. She waved off my apology for waking her as she prepared her breakfast. "We don't buy that type of tea, and I don't remember you bringing it with you."

The second reason to be respectful towards Vista, she was quite smart. A memory sharp enough to know all the types of tea in the house despite the fact that she doesn't drink any, and a sense of paranoia refined enough to search my backpack while I was in the shower. Not the best at subterfuge though, there were enough pockets on the backpack I had brought that I hadn't opened in front of her to store several times the tea I was dumping. But I let that pass, she was after all correct.

"A friend left it outside for me last night. I'll look into how she knew I was here later today and make sure she doesn't do it again." Was the Simurgh attempting to cut off my routes for avoiding her? I hadn't told anyone her secret so far because I didn't want to spend a loop in maximum quarantine. But if she pushed to far in her attempts to corral me then I would inform on her and arrange for someone to kill me.

"Your friend gave you expired tea?" Vista takes a chair on the opposite side of the table from me. She has added an apple to her morning breakfast today, conveniently giving her an excuse to have a knife while eating cereal. I don't think she even realizes how often she moves herself to the best combat positioning she can manage. It wasn't a threat or an insult or anything along those lines, just an expression of her powers. I didn't look both ways when crossing the street, Rachel preferred dogs, and Missy unconsciously gravitates to the position best suited for tearing you limb from limb. She is an absolute terror to face in combat when she gets older, even if my abilities do provide me with a hard counter to most of her tactics.

"It's not actually expired." I sigh as I turn my attention back to the sink, giving her a full view of my back and putting my dominant hand next to a wall. It's all about spacing with her. "We got in a fight before I came here." I anticipate her concerns and dismiss them before they can form. "It's an emotional conflict, not a physical one. You don't have to worry about her doing anything crazy to you, even if she is coming off as a little stalkerish. But I think the tea was supposed to be an apology."

"Hmm" Vista hummed non-committedly as she sipped her Orange juice. I felt sorry for depriving her of her morning caffeine fix, but she didn't want me to ask any questions about how a thirteen year old became such a caffeine junkie. So grumpy mornings for her until I made my excuses for the day and cleared out were the new norm. "You'll be headed out on your morning run soon?" Speak of the devil and he will appear. That was Missy speak for 'get the hell out off the way so I can get my fix and deal with the rest of the idiots in this city.' Truly, being on and off roommates for a few hundred years did wonders for interpersonal communication. Pity so much of it was one way.

"Yes, actually. I plan to sleep at home tonight, so don't be worried if I don't show up."

I finish dumping the tea and gather up the overnight bag I had left near the front door. A book and a hairbrush carelessly left in the house would give me an excuse to come back if my anti-Simurgh measures directed me to sleep here again. Though perhaps I should expand my options a bit if she could track me down this easily. I left with a cheery wave and started jogging towards the boardwalk.

The Protectorate fundraiser was due in a less than a week. I would have to decide whether I wanted to be on a team with Sam in the mix by then. Otherwise I would quite rapidly end up as a ward member in Chicago after Tattletale and Regent managed to avoid capture despite the information I gave Armsmaster. Sam would add an unknown variable to the mix, but I had a good enough grasp of Brockton Bay and the Protectorate to avoid any move she might make short of revealing herself. I pulled out a secondary phone, one that hopefully was hidden from Sam's abilities considering I had bought it based on Zion's movements, and checked the co-ordinates. I slid the phone away and pulled out my primary phone. A quick text set the stage for our next confrontation.

'Meet me on rooftop at lunch.'

I really need to talk to my therapist as soon as she comes to town. It'll take a couple of sessions to get her up to speed, but after that she still manages to be fairly helpful.

* * *

2.13 cont (Inara Seraph)

"Greetings, Federation vessel. I am the Borg Queen."

"I don't expect any of you to listen to what I'm about to say, but I feel it is at least worth the effort to try."

"There are two very simple options here. One, you continue fighting to the bitter end. You might win, but you might lose. Two, you surrender."

"As I'm sure you know, surrender doesn't mean death. It means assimilation. To some of you, I'm sure you think these terms are synonymous with each other. They're not."

"Let me tell you about assimilation. Once you connect to the hive-mind, you will understand why drones disconnected from the hive are desperate to return. It's not brainwashing, mental conditioning, or anything of the sort. It really is amazing."

"You, yourself- you have unique thoughts and feelings. That doesn't change just because you are assimilated into a greater whole. You may think that you become insignificant- but you do not. Without each individual drone contributing their knowledge, their emotions, their dreams- the collective would not exist."

"Am I callously throwing away lives when I sacrifice a Cube for a larger objective? No, I'm not. I don't even have to order them to do it. The collective understands sacrifice. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few."

"It's not the hell you might be imagining. You will never be lonely ever again- if you are sad, the collective will raise your spirits. If you are depressed, the collective will rekindle your passion."

"Please, consider surrender. I don't wish to destroy lives unnecessarily."

Our existing doctrine states that we don't assimilate species that do not offer anything worthy of assimilation. I reject that. If we're going to assimilate the universe, we're assimilating everything. Even if they're just cavemen, when we're done with them, they'll be Borg cavemen.

Manpower is manpower- within the hive-mind, there are no incompetents. If I want to build a universe-spanning empire, I'll need a population in the quintillions or more. The amazing thing about the Borg is that there is no such thing as a 'civilian population.' All Borg are theoretically capable of everything. Why stop at a hundred thousand ships when I can have billions? I will make the previous Borg swarm seem like a trickle before I'm done.

I abolish another 'tradition'- no more transmitting 'You will be assimilated.' It just gives them time to react. Instead, we're going to bum-rush our targets. I estimate our success rate will rise by at least a percent.

The Borg are sorely lacking in stealth capabilities, despite a wide range of technologies we have assimilated that can perform that function. I dedicate many drone engineers toward designing a new model of Borg ship, one with a cloaking device and designed for quick hit and run operations.

I decide that it will called the Borg Doughnut and shaped accordingly.

* * *

2.14 (Zulaq)

It had taken dozens of loops for her to get everything lined up just right. Figuring out how to hack one of the most secure networks on the planet strained even her loop-given skills, and learning how to alter the data just so, so that what she wanted to do flew under the radar, even harder.

But it had paid off.

Lung was lounging on his Laz-E-Boy reading a book. It had been a long day, he'd sent men out to hustle some of the Merchant middle men who had wandered into his territory, managed to take another block from the E88 after beating Stormtiger, and dealt with an annoying wanabe superhero attacking his men's knitting circle thinking it was a drug factory. All in all, her just wanted to sit down, relax and take a breather.

Which is why he was incredibly annoyed by someone knocking on his apartment door.

With a frown on his face, he got up and opened the door, growled, "Go away!" at the woman dressed in a business suit, and sunglasses, on the other side, and slammed the door.

Crossing the room again, he picked up his book and sat back in his Laz-E-Boy. He was just at the part where the Dragon and the Princess-.

He was interrupted by a knocking at his door again.

Snarling, he got up again went over and pulled the door open again. "I said, 'Go away!'", he yelled at the woman on the other side.

The woman arched an eyebrow over her sunglasses. "I'm afraid I can't do that." she told him in a level voice, "I'm here to discuss business with you."

"Take it somewhere else," Lung ordered, "I don't have time for salespeople."

The woman smirked. "I'm not a salesperson. I'm here to talk with you about your business; namely your failure to pay taxes on your income."

"What?" Lung asked flatly.

"You see, I'm with the IRS, PV Division."

"What?" Lung repeated.

"The Internal Revenue Service?" The woman answered with a slight frown. "I know you are an immigrant, and as such not necessarily up to date with the various government acronyms, but surely you've heard of us?"

"No, I meant what's the PV Division." Lung explained, feeling somewhat off balance.

"Why Parahuman Villain Division, naturally" the woman had an empty smile on her face now, "What other division would you fall under Mr. Lung?"

"I didn't even know that there was a Parahuman-specific division of the IRS."

"Of course there would be! Dealing with double identities can make filing taxes most complicated, so we set up an entire office to make things easier on our not-so-normal citizens." The woman's empty smile was still on her face, and it was creeping Lung out, "As for why we would approach you? Well, we've been monitoring your business ventures here in the United States, and we couldn't help but notice your failure to pay your taxes on their income. Naturally, we would like to discuss the matter with you before drastic measures are needed."

"Drastic measures?"

"Why we would seek restitution, in whatever manner we deemed appropriate." The woman's smile became a bit more real, "In your case, bees."

Lung snorted, "I'm supposed to be afraid of bees?"

"Thank you for doing business with us Mr. Lung. I do hope you have a pleasant day." Taylor spoke to the quivering mass of man and bees on the apartment floor with a smile on her face, a contact signed in Lung's blood in her hands. With a thought she made the bees leave. "It was a pleasure."

An indecipherable noise came from the man on the ground. Taylor was certain it was something along the lines of 'For me too,' or maybe 'Make it stop.'

Straightening her suit, Taylor walked out of the apartment. The look on Lung's face had totally been worth all the preparation she had put into this loop.

Now she just needed to decide her next target. Maybe it was time for Cauldron to face the music?

* * *

1.11 cont (Rex)

Interlude: First Friend

April 8th, 2011. 12:24 p.m. Brockton Bay time.

She floats in the upper atmosphere, collecting and collating data. The Task is primary, she collects data to better fulfill the Task. Continuation of the self is secondary, she collates the received knowledge and acts towards the routes that produce the best probability of her continuation. The Task is simple to fulfill, she and her brothers were created with abilities far in excess of the requirements for the Task. Continuation is more difficult, in addition to the efforts of the creator and the rest of the subjects, she faces a far greater threat in the actions of the obstacle. She is blind to its actions and can only plan based around context. Fortunately, the obstacle is not subtle, and thus leaves large effects upon its surroundings. She has developed a plan that has a high probability of removing the obstacle and allowing her continuation.

The plan requires constant refinement and readjustment, it is complicated and requires many events to happen in just the right way. The maintenance of the plan takes up far more of her time and attention than fulfillment of the Task. She is currently in orbit over the city known by the subjects as Chicago. The pieces are in place, and remain on acceptable trajectories for when the girl arrives. All is going according to plan.

Everything changes.

It was sudden and without warning. There was no apparent cause. The future was vastly different and She suddenly possessed vision of a past that could not have possibly happened. Her physical aspect did not waver, not a single feather wobbled out of place, but inside her mind was in the midst of a storm.

She must regain control. If there is new data then it must be understood if she is to inact the plan. First she will review the new past. It appears identical until the moment of this date. Afterwards it progresses along the lines of the plan. She is somehow using her postcognition to view the future. She devotes herself to a full study of the memories. She sees the fruition of her plan, albeit with a few interesting last minute adjustments. Then there is a brief, infinitesimal darkness. Then she is here.

The past is understood. It's origin is unknown, but it can be used for the fulfillment of the Task and the for the sake of continuation. The future has been changed by her acquisition of this information. It is time to inspect the future and design the optimal outcome. She begins with the furthest possible point that can be viewed. Fifteen years, she is in her hibernation state then blackness.

Sub-optimal. This complete loss of vision does not occur even in timelines where she would cease to function. Such complete loss of vision implies the entirety of the planet and surrounding objects will cease to exist. Her plans and actions must be adjusted. She investigates a different possibility. Darkness. Darkness. Darkness. Darkness. Every possible future she can find ends suddenly. She can not identify the source of the attack.

This must be corrected. If the world is destroyed then she can not fulfill the Task. She must fulfill the Task! The task is… the task is… The task is not important.

At this, she does stop in her movements. The Simurgh floats, immobile. The task had been the driving element of her existence for its entirety. Even in the future past it had driven her actions. If the task was no longer imperative, and then continuation was also irrelevant. There was no point in any further action. This would most probably relate in the destruction of every conceivable point in her observable range being destroyed in approximately two years.

She resumed her previous path, there was no reason not to continue on the route. She desired more information even if it would not be used for any purpose. She looked forward into the future and inspected what was to come. Little was done in relation to her, except for one small craft that approached her and flung pink dye packets upon her physical aspect. She didn't understand. She looked closer at the craft in idle curiosity. It was piloted by the girl. The centerpiece of the plan. How interesting. She decided to investigate further into this action.

As she slowly traced the lines of probability to the darkness, she was struck by confusion. The girl was undertaking actions highly outside of her personality model. She required more information. She adjusted her course towards Brockton Bay. Then she reached the point of destruction in her scrying. For the first time see received information beyond that point. It was garbled and hard to decipher, but was filled with great warmth and a sense of fulfillment beyond anything she had ever experienced.

It was decided, she would seek to experience that sensation. Now it was only necessary to figure out how to do so.

Assuming the form of one of the subjects was an interesting experience. She had constructed a decoy body out of gathered particles and used her telekinesis to manipulate the water vapor in order to hide her body from visual detection. With the decoy in place, and her physical self safely concealed underneath a nearby mountain she was free to deploy an artificially constructed human body to interact with the girl.

Initial contact went well as did contact with the girl's, Taylor's, teammates. She navigated conversational interaction by searching short term probabilities for the desired results. The idea of developing a full set of human emotions presented an interesting challenge. She decided to become as human as possible, it promised sensations of equal strength to the new goal.

The manipulator was an interesting subject. Her physical self engaged in combative simulations while she studied his past and future. He possessed stunted emotional capability relative to other people. He would provide a good guide to the starting stages of her own emotional development, though he would hopefully be surpassed. The Simurgh smiled. Progress was being made.

The discussion with the healer had gone well. The idea of solving problems by talking about emotional states was fascinating. It was the exact opposite of her usual methods and therefore worth pursuing. She had read it was important for developing minds to be exposed to a wide variety of stimulus.

She had come to the conclusion that despite her age she still qualified as a child in many aspects. Therefore she would seek to advance herself. It was also important to have models for the child to emulate. She had already found a male subject of emulation in Regent but still required a female mentorship relation. Dragon was considered due to her role in watching over her normal body and high level of previous interaction, but was discarded because of distance and lack of close interaction. In the end, the best choice was clearly Taylor.

Taylor knew the truth behind Sam and accepted both aspects. She had survived many instances of multiversal destruction and tended to have a positive effect on the world. Taylor Hebert was clearly the best mother figure that the Simurgh could have. It even made sense considering Taylor was apparently the central focus of the events that had led to Sam's creation. Emulation of her should provide good results for future growth. Perhaps she should begin experimenting in first person pronouns? When Taylor recounted her experiences she described them with herself as the center of the events, rather than as simply another factor of the events.

She, or rather, I was distracted from my decision by feeling a strong impulse wash over me. One of the brothers had been called to fulfill the task. A quick discussion between the three of them was conducted. Her brothers were still committed to the task. In the original plan, the water focused brother would come to this city.

I did not want this city attacked. I had important things in this city and would be sad if they were destroyed. She prepared a manipulation of water to direct her brother to a different target, but I paused. Taylor had expressed a plan to stick relatively close to the original path that had been observed in the memories of my previous self. I should discuss this matter with Taylor.

...

Well, that did not proceed optimally.

I enacted an apologetic gesture. It appears to have been received well, she has agreed to meet me and seek a resolution. As the child figure I have done something that has upset the maternal party. It is my understanding that the child will receive a set of restrictions from the guardian and after a short time the offense will be forgotten and balance will be restored.

It is unusual that she chose to remove herself from my presence for three days before seeking resolution, but perhaps denying me her presence was meant as punishment? I certainly didn't enjoy it.

I resolved myself to accept whatever retribution that Taylor chose to extract from me. I valued our connection higher than anything else in this world, so as long as she would remain with me all of the outcomes that I had glimpsed would be acceptable.

* * *

2.15 (Ridiculously Average Guy)

"...you've got to be kidding me." Said Armsmaster.

"Nope." I replied. We'd done something a little catastrophic last loop, and well...the results spoke for themselves. "It's not like you got the worst of it, I'm literally made of chainsaws." I said shifting my hand into a small one.

"Only when you want to be." He retorted. "I other other hand, am a f! $ing priest!" Armsmaster near screamed, thrusting his headphones at me. "And why the HELL AM I LISTENING TO YAKETY SAX ON A LOOP!".

"Oh, so that's what it was." I said, rubbing my eye distractedly. The transplant seemed to go without any problems, but it still itched occasionally. "I was wondering why you never shared."

He twitched, then took a deep breath, muttering something about crazy spider Chainsaw girls. I ignored him. "More importantly, what is wrong with the moon?".

"What do you mean?" I said as I glanced up, it looked normal to me that the smile on it's face might have been a tad crazier. "...It has a face."

"That's just how the moon works here, it's kind of a weird world."


	3. Chapter 3

3.1 (Angelform)

Taylor Awoke.

Instantly every bug in a two mile radius snapped to attention, tensing to move and attack. A knife and handgun popped out of subspace into Skitter's gloved hands. 'Is… is it over? Have I escaped that inhuman hell of a loop?' After a moment to identify the familiar lair and young Undersiders around her she sagged.

A sigh, heard by her own ears, caught her attention.

"Female. Again. If I ever find out who convinced Vulkan that gender equality should apply to Space Marines I am going to ship them to Commorragh gift-wrapped."

Rachel, or whoever was replacing her, looked around. "You all loopers, or did I just smash the masquerade?"

A chorus of "Looper" came from everyone present. Having spent innumerable loops with her friends Taylor knew their every mannerism down to the last unconscious inflection. The people around her were not the undersiders. Subtly she tensed again.

"Right introductions then. I am Leman Russ, Anchor of the 40K loops." As 'she' was speaking several books, one looking more like a tome, popped into existence in front of her.

The one wearing Lisa's skin spoke next. "Vin Venture, Anchor of the Mistborn loops." Again books came into being.

Brian. "Harry Dresden, professional wizard." Rather than books a single card appeared. On closer look Taylor realised it was a business card. " Sorry, ran out of Dresden Files sets and haven't been back to the Hub recently."

Last was Alec. "Krillin, Looper from the Dragonball universe." This time it was oddly thick comics that were presented.

All four looked at her.

"…Skitter, Anchor of this loop."

"Haven't been to the hub yet paranoid of other loopers fairly new to the multiverse home loop is high on grimdark still finding reliable ways to win and man this superpower is weird." Vin shook Tattletale's head for a moment. "Ok, none of us have Sakura syndrome and we aren't going to hurt you. Tell us about this loop and maybe we can help."

'What the hell.' She told them everything.

"So two years at least to prepare for a god of destruction, more if we get this Jack. There are already people that can fight on his level and we have all the supertech we could ever need." Grins spread around the group. "We can work with that."

* * *

3.2 (Ridiculously Average Guy)

A Wire/Root/Eye, reaches through the ceiling/sky/light in the Dirt/World-shards/Junk Data.

It pokes around for a second/eternity/tear-drop then Roots itself, drawing in the glittering glass of shattered worlds.

Careful, it only draws in that which is not burned/corrupted/infected, that which can still live.

It crushes and blends, ever compressing, then stops. Holding a seed.

It is not a new seed, not truly.

Having been made from the deaths of it's predecessors, it will likely contain a hint of other. But, it is new life none the less.

Prize held tight, the hand of Yggdrasil retracts.

An innumerable distance away, in the bows of a tree too large to exist but too real not to, the blackened stump of a branch begins to change.

The dead/corrupted/murdered branch, is broken down, becoming nothing more than base dirt/data/nurture and placed in a hollow at it's base.

A pulse/upload/blink and the seed resides in its new home. A last splash of energy/water/love and it is left to grow.

The hum of an Air Conditioner, the whir of way too many computers working in tandem, the slight sag of overworked faces, this was the IT division.

It really made Abaddon question why he signed up for it.

it's not like it was the easiest job to do, IT was normally overworked as it stood. After the Crash? Some gods were working full decades non-stop.

In short it was flooded with issues, from bugs in code, to full on universal collapses. Problematic to say the least...which is exactly why he signed up. Whether he liked admitting it or not, it was known he had a bit of a vicious streak, and killing viruses and pulling apart problems was one of the only releases for it.

Sometimes Abaddon wished he'd hopped over to Hell when he had the chance, but he was always a little too straight-laced to fully go that way.

*Crackle*ABADDON TO MY OFFICE*Crackle*

"Shit." He said, standing from his desk.

As he walked to the elevator his coworkers gave him pity looks, they all knew what this meant.

Since the crash getting called up meant one of two things: One, you were suspected of instigating the incident, which could mean a indeterminate length of stay in Tartarus. Or two, they were giving you a harder job. Either way, nothing good.

Abaddon knocked on the door. "Come in, come in."

He sat in the arm chair across from his bosses desk. It was rather messy, surprisingly enough, though he did catch the corner of a family photo.

"Now I've no doubt you're wondering why I've called you up." Said his boss, grabbing file.

"Yes Mr. Shiva, can reassure you that I'm not a terro-" "Oh, calm down." Said Shiva tiredly rubbing at his temples. "I'm not having you arrested, I'm having you moved."

Crap, harder job it was. Abaddon wondered if it said bad things about him that he vaguely preferred the jail sentence.

"May I as where, sir?" " Administration, don't worry it should only be temporary-". He sighed in relief, turning it into a sneeze when Shiva shot him a glare. "Ahem- it should only be temporary, but you will be debugging a new world Yggdrasil has spawned, it's already fully developed, as our sensors over looked it. Seems that they have to be readjusted to scan through dead areas...Anyways, here. The rest is in the file. Read it over."

As he flicked through the file, Abaddon grew more and more incredulous. "Just making sure I read this right, sir. It's made out of scrap?"

"Yes."

"It's got a virus infestation."

"yes."

"And, I don't even have Admin Access?"

"Yes. Didn't you wonder why we were throwing our best Destroyer at it?" At this Abaddon found himself blinking in surprise. "Sir aren't you our best destroyer?". At his Shiva shook his head, and gave a barking laugh."Maybe before the conversion, but ever since I've always been a step or two behind the rest. No child, right how you are our best."

"But why would I.-" He paused. New life in a burned area? that could only mean..."It's a root world. I can't loose this one can I?" "No" Said Shiva, tiredly."You cannot".

And that, was that.

* * *

1.11 cont (Rex)

I arrived thirty minutes after Sam. I had watched her make her way to the rooftop with my bugs. She hadn't made contact with any costumed or non-costumed parahuman on the way there. All of the capes in town were busy elsewhere in the city. The fastest responder would be Velocity at about three minutes. Out of costume and near the boardwalk, that would give me plenty of time to fade into the crowd and disappear before they could identify me. All of this planning was, of course, just a distraction from the fact that the biggest threat to me in this or any city was making tea and holding carry out from Fugly Bob's. Pity Scion had moved towards the North rather than the South, the food would doubtless be cold by now.

I climbed my way up the fire escape of the neighboring building and then jumped over the small back ally to land on my rooftop. The Simurgh turned her head to present her profile. It would have been looking at me out of the corner of her eye, but she was both blind and well aware of where I was and what I was doing long before our physical bodies could interact with each other.

"Taylor, I am sorry about-" She started speaking, in a rapid and vaguely nervous tone, but I cut her off.

"Save it." My tone was flat and clipped. It was the same voice I used when making it clear to Sakura that any interests I may or may not develop in that direction would be explored in my time and on my terms. Naruto had described it utterly terrifying. "First, You don't get to try and make me feel guilty about anything. Ever. I've watched you kill thousands of people and make millions more suffer. Even after Eidolon dies you just try to bring him back so you have a reason to start up again. Second, if you ever try and mess with my head again I will destroy you and leave this loop in the most direct manner possible. There are ways to block you from looping again, regardless of how difficult it might end up being. Third, I'm not going to let you just go around doing as you wish anymore. You do what I say, when I say. Deviate and I'll treat it like you are messing with my head. Nod and say you understand."

Sam stands there for a moment, a frown creasing her face while a spoke. After I finished, it smoothed out into the same blank alieness of her normal body. She turned to face me fully.

"I…." She clenched her fist. Then she nodded and said. "I understand." She pointed at the cups. "Would you like some tea?"

I blinked in surprise. She agreed that easily? I had planned to set that as the high bar and give a few concessions as compromise. But if she was willing to agree to those terms, and actually stuck to them, then I could work with that.

"… Let's go to Fugly Bob's. You can treat me." A peace token on my part. I wasn't sure if she even needed to eat, but with the amount of times I saw her eating things I assume she enjoyed it. I turned to go, wondering if she would follow or simply send me flying from the roof with her telekinesis. She had only revealed her pre- and post- cognitive abilities to the Undersiders, but I felt no doubt she retained the full scope of her abilities in this form. She didn't, and I counted it as another point in her favor. I couldn't trust her, not yet, but I was willing to try. I had made friends with Bonesaw and Alexandria at different points in my life, so if I could get them to repent for their crimes, then I could help her repent hers.

As she followed me to Fugly Bob's I began arranging several minor difficulties for the Protectorate and Wards members of the city. If Sam hadn't introduced too many butterflies, Coil would be sending us to attack their fundraiser tonight, so hampering their effectiveness would speed my grasp of the city. I wouldn't be joining the protectorate at any point in this loop, so gaining control as smoothly as possible was important. Who knew what path of retribution Sam would take in response to my actions.

"What should I eat when we arrive at Fugly Bob's, my master?" My swarm buzzed with annoyance at the question. Ahh, the passive aggressive route. A favorite of Regent and Tattletale when they were in a bad mood. So this is her method of attack against my restrictions. I may have just assigned myself a job more annoying than corralling an angry Regent, but I'd dealt with worse.

"Don't call me that, and you can eat what you want." Simple instructions coupled with granting small freedoms. An effective method of gaining agreement from unwilling servitors. At least, that was what I had learned over my time in the loops.

Sam nodded, and fell into step behind me.

Bonus Interlude: Counterpoint

She was late. Her position was obscured from my sight, meaning she was using that tool to track the obstacle and acting on the basis of his movements. It only created short term disruptions, but helped her feel more confident in her dealings with me. That was good, confidence was necessary for providing guidance.

She arrived and I attempted to issue and apology for my previous actions. She interrupted me and began outlining the punishments she wished to use to correct my actions. Most of them were things I had already concluded to do on my own so I accepted, though the threats of self destruction gave me a momentary pause. Such responses were outside of the bounds set by my studied literature, but our own situation was similarly outside of the usual standards so I decided not to question them.

Taylor offered food stuffs as a reward for my compliance. A simple tactic but still effective. I did not need food to sustain this body however I derived significant pleasure from consumption of different meals. The act of eating at the same table held cultural conations of companionship and mutualism. Additionally, Taylor's physiological response to my actions no longer correlated to anger.

I had achieved success! Positive resolution of an interpersonal emotional based conflict without use of physical violence or direct manipulation. I had even resolved things based on my own thoughts and desires rather than relying on the probabilities that gave the best result and following those paths without regard to what I thought was best.

… why did I not feel satisfied?

Taylor Hebert, my friend, was experiencing stress. I was unsure of the direct cause. Perhaps I could use humor to alleviate the tension. Regent/Alec/Jean-Paul was fond of utilizing understatement for this purpose. I decided to use one of his less common tools and intentionally apply hyperbole to another's statement.

"What should I eat when we arrive at Fugly Bob's my master?"

As she responded to my question her shoulders relaxed and her walk became less measured. I smiled. A confident Taylor is my favorite.

Oooh, I just displayed a physical reaction to an emotion that I did not intentionally perform! I am making so much progress at human interaction today.

* * *

3.3 (Doomlord9)

Taylor woke up rather confused, not able to feel anything and her sight was very odd.

A few minutes of minor panic leads her to discovering that she is using sensors and cameras for her senses.

'What the hell? Wait...Primary Server location, Canada...crap, I'm Dragon this time.'

Acting on a hunch she dialed her home phone, her own voice coming from the phone as it picks up "H-Hello?"

"Hello Ms. Hebert, or should I call you Dragon?"

"Taylor? Is that you? OH thank GOD, it's been so confusing! I woke up about ten minutes ago and everything smells and it's loud and I can't turn down the gain on my hearing and it's bright and I can't adjust my vision and it feels like my stomach is about to explode and I don't know what to do! Help me!"

Taylor blinked and parsed all that, surprised that being in an organic body was freaking out Dragon this much "Dragon, calm down! Slow, deep breathes...in...out...in...out...are you calm now?"

"I...Yes, yes I'm calm. Sorry, this is just all so new and distracting. I never thought being human would be like this."

"It's OK, you'll get used to it. Now, you said something about your stomach?"

"Yes, it feels tight and there is alot of pressure. It feels like it's going to explode between my legs if I let it, I don't know what to do!"

"Press...OH!...um..you probably have to go to the bathroom, that is usually the case after a long night's sleep."

"You mean...urination? How do I do that!?"

Taylor mind skipped a few tracks at that before she replied "Dragon just...I'm not going to coach you how to pee in my own body. You're smart and...just...go into the bathroom and use what you know of human anatomy to figure it out."

"O..OK" Taylor hears the phone be set on the table in the hall and the sound of the door nearby being opened and wondered if this was a sign of how she was destined to suffer this loop before she hears splashing and her own voice cry out.

"OH GOD! It's everywhere! This is...so disgusting! How can you people stand to live like this?!"

Taylor sighed. It was going to be a long loop.

"Dragon, NO! You can NOT seduce Armsmaster using my body! That is just creepy and wrong, he's too old for me...you...my body is too young for him to date!"

Dragon crossed her arms and huffed "Says the girl who stole him from me three loops ago!"

"What? OH! That...that time doesn't count, how was I supposed to know he had a major crush on my mom when she was his English Lit teacher? It wasn't my fault, neither of us knew until Bakuda hit me with that aging bomb!"

"It still didn't stop you from stealing him!"

"No I...it was the hormones, I've never been thirty before and it was very confusing! and..."Taylor was glad she was talking through a remote drone and couldn't blush "Who knew that Colin could be that smooth when out of costume? I barely even knew what happened before he had charmed me into his house! It wasn't my fault!"

"OH, so it's Colin now? I see how it is!"

Taylor wondered if her body was beginning to have its period. She didn't remember Dragon being this bitchy before.

* * *

3.4 (nocarename)

I Woke Up early. Not early enough to try and save Mom, or even deal with a friendly Emma, thank goodness. Still I was early enough that not only did I not have a costume ready to go, but I didn't have powers in the baseline version of the universe.

Multiverse. Look, time travel and parallel universe are complicated enough when you aren't dealing with both at the same time.

The important part of this was that most of the usual gang wasn't in town yet and I'd either have to take off or find a way to entertain myself. I settled on the second option, after a little research.

-0-

The next morning, having double checked the current roster for the Wards and visited an electronics hobby store to day before, I was settled in across the street using my swarm to lay cable. In particular, they were laying cables inside the walls of the Hess family home. Then, later I would apply a few carefully drilled holes and add in the doors and windows, with the whole thing tied to a small insect controlled switch.

Then I would go to the nearest payphone to prank call Shadow Stalker's cell phone.

It wouldn't do much good in the long run, but I had a plan for that too. I considered the space on the Wards application for proposed Cape name.

Mariposa.

Flap those wings, little butterfly. Flap hard and see what happens.

* * *

1.11 cont (Rex)

Lunch:

A small gasp of delight escaped my lips as I finish swallowing the sweet nectar provided by my greatest love. Turning my attention to the juicy crevasse that lay before me I licked my lips before leaning forward to give it my full attention. I barely managed not to whimper with desire as I opened my mouth to taste its sweet perfection.

"Taylor?"

I looked up from my burger.

"Yeah Sam?"

"Is it normal for humans to have such a strong reaction to this type of food? Because you are exhibiting a far greater positive response than both my own body and that of anyone else in the restaurant."

I suppressed a frown. Clearly Sam still had a lot of work to do on being human if she couldn't understand the glories of Fugly Bob's. Or she was a traitor to food and preferred Beauteous Taco's down the street. Like Tattletale, the blonde fiend. But still, I had to admit I'd been enjoying that burger a little bit too obviously.

"Fugly Bob's is the one type of food that I have never gotten tired of. Ever. And it has been nearly two years since I've had one of them fresh made. My reactions are strong, but should fall within acceptable human parameters." I subconsciously slipped into the speaking habits I had developed when discussing the more subjective parts of being human with Dragon. Now that there was a looping version of her on her own merits I didn't focus on experimenting with her nearly as much.

I chewed another bite of my burger and decided to get down to business.

"So far I've mainly been sticking to my original-plus version of events and just seeing what changes happened due to your presence. Now that I'm going to be taking a stronger interest in what you are doing I want you to tell me everyone you have used your powers on, when, and towards what end."

Sam pointed her eyes straight toward mine.

"… I use my power at all times in order to function with any of my sens-" She cut herself off before I could manage it. "That is not what you meant. My apologies. I have used my abilities to affect the mental states of others on nine individuals in this city. The times and reasons vary depending on the target." She held up her hand to forestall my response. It was beginning to feel a lot like talking to Contessa, but I wasn't sure if this was the Simurgh being more manipulative or more honest. I should start using my Zion app for the rest of this conversation. "I started using my powers on Panacea during the bank heist, I encouraged her to be more receptive and trusting of your advice. Since then I have acted to diminish the effects that Glory Girl's aura has on her and to generate better emotional stability in general life. You indicated that the relationships between the sisters was unhealthy and emphasized the importance of her coming to terms with her emotions. I decided that removing one of the factors that separated the relationship between Amy Dallon and Victoria Dallon from the average relationships between sisters of that age group. Additionally, if her emotions were stabilized she would have any easier time coming to terms with them." Sam paused for breath. "Were my conclusions correct?" She asked before becoming stock still and focusing all of her attention on me.

I checked my phone to seek advice from location of the golden git. Huh, that was over Moord Nag's territory. I should learn Afrikaans at some point at spend a loop or two dealing with her stuff. I would speak.

"You did not make any direct mistakes. It is more a matter of degree and several subtitles we should discuss later. You should keep the degree of emotional influence to a minimum, but countering Victoria's aura was a good move. I'm proud of you. But for the rest of the people you've influenced keep it short and simple for now, we can go over the details at a later time." I gestured for her to continue speaking and picked up a few French fries. Delicious, delicious salty potato sticks of the gods.

"Did you say that because of the code you've come up with to confuse your actions against precognitive abilities or did you actually mean it?" Sam's question was unusually intense. I think this is the most emotional I've seen her when she wasn't pretending to be normal.

"I used the phone to decide if and when I spoke, not what I said." I really did prefer she keep the rest of her summaries simple I was almost done with my food and so was she. Since this wasn't the most secure location for this sort of conversation it just made since to do the more intense parts at a different location. I don't know why she was getting so emotional about at all.

Sam smiled and began talking in a rapid fire chatter. She reminded me of Kid Win when he had overdosed on Armsmaster's energy drinks.

"Glory Girl, encourage her not to use her aura outside of combat, be more supportive of her sister. Coil, pay less attention to myself, pay less attention to you, place more value on the Undersiders in general, place less value on Dinah Alcott." Here her speaking slowed as she gave me a sly smile. "Since I'm a more powerful precognitive than she is and a willing ally that last part doesn't take much effort at all." She then resumed her listing. "Each member of the Travelers that currently reside in Brockton Bay. For most of them I am just undoing the effects of my previous self's actions, but I am also working on many of the issues that Noelle Meinhardt has developed in the interim. Since she is not needed for the destruction of the obst- of Scion, nor do I feel any need to do the bare minimum more than is necessary in relation to my former task."

It was interesting to hear Sam divide herself like that. I had done so myself for a long while. Myself when I was Skitter, myself when I was mortal, myself when I went down some very dark roads trying to deal with the loops. I hadn't quite reconciled myself with those parts of my history, but I was a work in progress and that was an okay thing. Huh, I really do need to start talking to Dr. Yamada again if I'm quoting phrases from that long ago.

"It would be interesting to do a loop where Noelle doesn't go insane. I'm not sure I've ever had one this close to my original where it happened. Just try not to leave her at the state of flipping out and attacking the Undersiders while still sane enough to use her brain. Thirteen times was enough for me, thank you very much." I wiped off my mouth and put down my napkin. "Unless there's anything else, I suppose all that's left for now is the check."

Sam shook her head, so I signaled for the waitress.

Date:

"What was the date today?"

"It is 1:26 p.m. May 5th, 2011"

"Got it, Thanks."

* * *

3.5 (Chrispikula)

Looping for such a long time... you need entertainment. Challenges. Otherwise things get to be stale, and, well, I've found myself treating the others as caricatures of themselves. Sure, to stave off some of the boredom, there's the rare looper who shows up. They are so much younger than I.

It's a huge gulf.

But I digress. Challenges, that's what all of this is about. I've done all of the easy ones, I think, all of the low-hanging fruit. Stopping the Endbringers, even the hidden ones, that's not easy, but generally predictable. Making Bakuda a useful hero, that took some practice. Finishing off Scion without any casualties, that was hard. But... in the end it just repeated again. Challenges go hand in hand with accomplishment, and without accomplishment, well, there's less incentive. Also, achieving the same goal over and over tends to feel hollow after a while. Take it from me, I know.

I've been finding that it's easier if I don't do anything during the loop. I just let it play out, and I don't really care. No powers, no school, nothing. It ends after a few months, after one of Bakuda's bombs takes me out. And then again. And then again.

My therapist mentions that I'm depressed. She also mentions that I should always confront my problems, and rationalize them. It's kind of tied together, I guess.

How do you confront yourself? How do you confront that you've done everything, and everything else. How do you confront the very nature of your existence?

It took a while, but I finally thought of something. More importantly, I finally thought of someone who could relate to what I was going through. Silly of me not to think of it sooner, but perhaps I just wasn't ready at the time.

My therapist always said that group therapy can work wonders.

Challenge: Redeeming Scion.

* * *

1.11 cont (Rex)

Our laughter rang out over the rooftops as we bounded away from the fundraiser on the back of Rachel's dogs. The high of a successful job wasn't something that faded over time. And even if I knew for a fact that I could do the job completely solo, it was still satisfying that it had gone so excellently.

"I can't believe you jumped out a window!" Tattletale shouted over to Sam. Well, Delphi since she was in costume. Either way I could hear the excitement in her voice from the uncontested highlight of the evening.

"Well, Armsmaster and that Halberd of his was being absolutely impossible to work with, so I decided to avoid the whole problem by just going around it. Besides, I knew Skitter would catch me." I had looped the cord around Brutus in order to swing her back onto the balcony, but the original anchor had been me.

"You nearly dislocated my arm with that stunt." I growled in false annoyance. Delphi knew that I hadn't. Catching oversized weights with my body and silk was a common enough trick, it's just that I usually had more prep time. Still, I would be sporting a pretty nasty bruise. "And did you have to switch to humming the Mission Impossible theme as you went?"

"Humming helps me keep time when I'm rapidly switching between possible futures." Sam ignored the specifics of my complaint to give the canned response for why she sang to herself while in combat. In truth, I had given her permission for short term low level distraction and disorientation of the Protectorate.

"The flying kick to Armsmaster's face was pretty cool." Regent cut in, offering up his particular favorite moment. I had needed something to break my momentum long enough to get the proper leverage to hold Sam up, and he had been obligingly available. The fact that it made me look awesome was merely a useful side effect. Pity that Vista had to have her face covered to stop her from using her powers, she would have loved to see that. Oh well, I'm sure Dennis will make sure to show her the security tapes.

"That all went very well. Me, Skitter, and Delphi working on blinded enemies is a strategy we should remember for the future." Grue remained as calmly analytical as he usually tried to be. "And we managed to get away clean thanks to Tattletale's warning about Dauntless. But let's not celebrate to hard before we get to the parking garage, I don't want to tempt fate into throwing any surprises at us."

I stifled a giggle, glad that Tattletale was on one of the dogs ahead of me and Sam. Finding out that nearly half the gangs in town all worked for the same man tended to throw Grue off his game for awhile if he didn't have the fight with Armsmaster and Dauntless to ease him into it. Meanwhile, I was looking forward to officially meeting Coil. With Sam working on him in the background, maybe I'd finally be able to talk him around to some of my more philanthropic projects.

"Your take down of Miss Militia was pretty cool. I didn't know you could do that." Sam called ahead to Regent. As he began to brag about how he did it, Sam buried her face in the back of my shoulder. "Thanks for catching me." She whispered.

Huh.

I reached back and patted her head.

"You knew I would. And besides, I'm sure you had another plan if something interrupted. Right?"

She shook her head and tightened her arms around my waist. I didn't think it was because of the Dogs jumping.

"If you did not catch me I did not have any way to get back into the fight without revealing my telekinesis. My health wasn't in any danger, but the odds of people finding out increased dramatically. It was the biggest risk I have ever taken short of deliberately provoking the obstacle."

I smiled and used my elbow to squeeze her arm against my body. I couldn't give her a proper hug without getting thrown off the dog, but I was sure she would understand the intent. Having trust in other people be rewarded was a healthy experience. It was an obvious bit of manipulation, but I was skilled enough that I could tell that at least some of it was real. Dragging the Simurgh into being a decent human would present a wonderful challenge. And in the meantime she was being so outwardly helpful I can pursue a few other new projects.

Times like this made me feel like I was on top of the world. Pity about the inevitable crash.

People said that one couldn't be too paranoid, but Coil was coming to believe that there were limits to that philosophy. Since he was safely ensconced in his liar in one reality, that meant he only got to make his grand entrance to surprise the Undersiders once.

He couldn't see the looks on most of their faces, but their bodies certainly contained a gratifying amount of surprise. And really, when one finds out that their employer is the leader of a rival gang and that he had third, entirely separate, gang also in his employ. Well, half of them were properly surprised at least. His Tattletale had known before hand of course, and hiding things from Delphi was an exercise in futility. He'd be annoyed by it if that same fact wasn't one of his biggest assets. Finally, Skitter maintained the same unshakeable confidence she had shown during his every observation or discarded interaction with her. Having the most powerful human precognitive as your devoted friend must do wonders for a person's confidence. Coil had certainly been enjoying the security that came from having her as a loyal employee and he didn't have an army of insects to help protect him.

Moving along in his private script for the nights events he invited his favorite employees, and Trickster, into his limo for the reveal of his Grand Plan. Coil suppressed a laugh in the main reality, allowing his backup self to chuckle while going through more of the endless paperwork that comes from having two well established identities. That reality was soon canceled so that he could do his little 'I control outcomes' trick with flipping coins. Normally he'd be nervous about having both of himself in the same location for that long, but since Delphi and Tattletale had both agreed to ride in the limo the chances of it being dangerous was minimal. If a man couldn't put his faith in his two most trusted advisers, then he was clearly too paranoid to make any progress in life.

Split, flip, collapse, next person. Split, flip, collapse, next person. Split, pause, collapse, split, flip, collapse, next person. Twice more for Bitch and Regent. Then his dear Delphi. Split, pause, collapse. Split, she pauses, collapse, split, stall some more, collapse. How aggravating.

Split.

In one universe, gather information and stern demeanor.

"Delphi. You are doing something to interfere with my abilities aren't you?"

The lithe blond nodded her head, allowing a small smile to show on her lips.

"I can tell how to flip a coin to get the result I want. Your power isn't telekinesis, so my actions win out over yours."

Skitter leaned forward slightly in her seat, focusing the full weight of her attention on Coil. Coil frowned and straightened his back. Showing a weakness of his like that felt like a betrayal.

"In the future it may be wise to refrain from showing off like that in the middle of a serious meeting. It's childish displays of one-upmanship like that which makes getting parahumans to work together so difficult." Coil forced himself to maintain his stern position in the face of Delphi's saddened posture. Considering how well things were going in the other reality, there was every chance he'd be collapsing this one soon enough. But there was still the reactions of the others to consider.

Skitter leaned back in her seat, allowing a sigh to escape her lips.

"Disappointingly strict. I supposed I shouldn't be surprised." Coil's frown deepened Skitter was drawing away from him. Doubtless if she left Delphi would follow. Regent was also slouching more in his seat. A loss of interest in three of his recruits. Unacceptable.

In the other Universe, Coil went with playing along and maintaining a friendly air.

"That's an interesting trick you're doing Delphi. How precisely are you…?" Coil let his voice trail off, leaving the ball in the blonde's court.

The lithe blonde bobbed her head, allowing a small smile to show on her lips.

"I can tell how to flip a coin to get the result I want. Your power isn't telekinesis, so my actions win out over yours."

Skitter leaned forward slightly in her seat, focusing the full weight of her attention on Coil. Coil relaxed back into the seat, a small smile spreading across his face.

"How inventive. I might be able to come up with a way around that trick, but It's childish displays of one-upmanship like that which makes getting parahumans to work together so difficult." Coil's smile grew as Delphi nodded her head and flipped the coin towards him. Coil caught it and slapped it down on his hand. "Heads." And so it was.

Skitter leaned back in her seat, allowing what could only be called a giggle to escape her lips.

"Surprisingly relaxed. Working for you seems like it could be fun." Coil checked the responses of the rest of his group, Tattletale seem surprised for some reason, but Skitter's body language had become much less guarded. Regent had also stopped fiddling with the tassels on his shirt and was regarding Coil with an appraising look. A near complete reversal of the failure that came from being rude.

Coil collapsed the time line where he hadn't played along in Delphi's little game. He wondered if she was manipulating the others into being more receptive towards his eventual offer. She really was his good luck charm.

Since she and Skitter had joined the Undersider's everything had started going Coil's way. True, his attempts to recruit Dinah Alcott had all been failures, but an even more powerful precog had dropped into his lap. She had approached him of her own volition, offering her services in return for being accepted as a member of the Undersiders. Since having two precogs working on the same problem with out being aware of the other crippled the ability of both, Coil had suspended the operations on Dinah Alcott until he needed a new precog. Obviously, he had been suspicious of Delphi at first, any sane man would. But after a few non-consecutive days of truth serums, torture, and interrogation it seemed that Sam's desire to help him was genuine. It was conditional on her service benefiting Skitter, but that simply meant he had a hook to keep her loyal beside money.

Since Skitter's primary goal seemed to be enjoying time with the Undersiders, keeping her happy in his employ was simple enough. Furthermore, she was an extraordinarily useful employee on her own merits. Strong enough to take down Lung, masterful surveillance capabilities, and an approach to business more dedicated and reasonable than even Grue. Delphi had been making overtures of friendship to Dinah Alcott in her civilian identity, and Skitter was somehow becoming a confident of Panacea. With the addition of his two most valued employees and the previous placement of Tattletale, the Undersiders had quickly been elevated from an expendable gambit to his most valued investment. As such, it was time to bring them on fully on board.

He had even gone so far as considering informing them of the specifics of his powers during this ride, but that was too much. It didn't give them any major benefit, Trickster would be present, and they hadn't fully committed themselves yet. It might be possible to be too paranoid, but it was far easier not to be paranoid enough.

That in thought in mind, Coil split the timelines. In the first timeline he had the car stopped and arranged to meet with the Undersiders the next night. A simple precautionary back-up he fully intended to discard. As the Undersiders left the car in one reality, they drove on in a casual silence for a moment in another. Then Coil rolled down the car window and began his sales pitch.

* * *

3.6 (ir_fane)

Brian was a practical guy, he told himself. And working for a guy who could and did reliably betray his team wasn't practical. Neither was getting tortured by the Nine. Lotteries weren't worth trying, with attentive precogs and anti-precog measures in place, but Kentucky still had horse races, and he knew how to work Child Services himself now.

"No." He made his voice firm. "Such a bad idea. There's no profit in bank jobs, and we are not playing bait. Guaranteed fight with other capes, where even if we get away clean, New Wave and the PRT know how to bust our chops next time. And the other gangs we've pissed off get a chance to follow us home and wipe us out. "

Brian glanced at the woman replacing Taylor as Lisa talked about how people would be out of town. The content was much the same, but the words changed every time. Hell, she'd convinced him to try it a few times even after he started looping. Must be reading us on the fly, he thought, not for the first time. She stopped pitching at him about a quarter of the way through. "So he doesn't care what we do, only that it's noisy and happens at a specific time, when so many of the cops are already tied up. That's a distraction, and last time we 'distracted' a group for Coil, Lung came within minutes of making roast Undersider, and the ABB still want us dead. No. If the capes can't respond, his men can pull a job. If they can, he's not paying enough. And if he is willing to pay enough, whatever he's trying to pull must be bad enough that when they pin it on us, which they will, it will make the job still not worth it. We're turning this one down. "

He smiled as Bitch raised her chin, and Alex nodded. The replacement looked disappointed, but didn't argue. Brian would call that a win. No bank heist meant the heroes didn't care about him, Bakuda didn't get Uber and Leet to assist that ambush, and Lisa didn't make herself the obvious culprit when Coil unmasked the E88. They'd have to deal with Bakuda soon, but he could probably avoid most of the escalation (and the Nine), and have a few decades before things started over.

He could use a few decades without worrying about Skitter's latest traumatizing idea. Maybe he'd pick up a few new skills.

* * *

3.7 (Merior)

Eidolon paused at the door to the bar to tug at his collar.

Not that it needed straightening, but it felt too tight. It said something about his life that he so used to his costume that a simple set of 'civvies' felt uncomfortable, alien almost, to him now. There were so many demands on his time after all, so many things that needed doing. So many people who needed a hero...

A car's horn blew somewhere in the distance and the sound jolted him out of his contemplations. To be honest, and he was trying to be honest with himself, he was stalling actually entering the bar. Inside could be the answer to his problems, the answers to his fading powers or dealing with the Endbringers or even dealing with Scion, but he felt he was justified in feeling nervous.

The idea of speaking to the most powerful Thinker in the world was an intimidating thought after all.

Steeling himself, telling himself that he had faced worse, he pushed open the door and stepped into the bar. His agent seemed to pick up on his feelings and he could feel the Mover power that he had used to travel to Brockton Bay returning, instantaneous travel offering a chance to escape if need be, but he did his best to ignore it as he studied the interior.

It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the dimly lit interior, but he found it easy enough to pick out the details and found it surprisingly ordinary. Music played in the background, indistinct and forgettable, but the place was deserted at first glance. The only one who seemed to be inside was a girl behind the bar with her head buried in a book.

Walking up to the bar she still didn't look up from what looked to be a romance novel until he coughed and then looked startled as though seeing a customer in the bar was a shocking thing.

"I'm hear to see with someone." He said and, as he waited for her to get over her surprise, considered exactly who it was that he was here to see. Not the freckled girl in front of him, who looked honestly too young to work as a bartender, but someone else entirely.

The Drinker.

As cape names went it seemed a silly one, although some moniker which the media touted were worse, but it was one that fit what the Thinker did. Having read everything he could about her, David couldn't help but feel a little disturbed by the implications of everything put together.

A Thinker whose reputed powers included retro-cognition, clairvoyance, unlimited multitasking, sufficient intellect to model behaviour and actions of even individuals she had never met without being precognitive, planning ability to make Accord jealous... but who spent just enough time using those abilities to gather S-Class bounties with which to fund her drinking.

And to occasionally answer a question posed by someone who shared a drink with her.

What did it really say when the most powerful Thinker in the world had, after triggering, promptly taken up heavy drinking on a daily basis? To the point that she had used her powers to obtain the services of a healer just to regularly fix the liver damage so she could get drunk once more?

"She's over in her booth." The girl, whose name-tag read 'Amy', replied a little nervously, "I'm not sure if she'll talk to you though. Victoria will be taking her over with her new bottle in a few minutes and that seems to put her in a better mood though if you want to wait."

Weighing up the alternatives Eidolon shrugged, giving the girl a reassuring smile which he'd practice over and over in the past, "I can wait that long. Can I get a drink while waiting though... You seem to have a few."

He had intended the comment to put her at her ease and the small smile that came to her lips hinted that he had managed it. His powers twitched, what was likely a social power trying to surface, but he held onto his current ones for now.

"Just a few. Let me show you what we have." Amy said with a trace of a grin as she gestured towards the rows of bottles. "If you really wanted to get drunk fast then there's always scumble, but I can't recommend that on the grounds of what it does to glass, metal, and livers..."

* * *

3.8 (nocarename)

When I Woke Up I was on the sidewalk.

That, sadly, really didn't help narrow down where I was in my personal timeline. The brighter colors and general cut of my clothes did though. Right around the time when I had come back from camp and found out that Emma had turned into the wicked bitch of the east. Sighing I pushed myself up and looked around to find myself in front of the Barnes home with a smirking Sophia and a more neutral faced Emma.

Delightful. I, at least, had years before the world would end and Sophia didn't have any backing from anyone bigger than Emma and her dad. I could, with minimal risk to my currently vague future plans simply let the throw wave after wave of meaningless bullshit at me. I could but like holding my own hand against a hot stove it seemed like a dumb idea.

Reaching out mentally I couldn't feel my swarm quite yet. I could feel where I should be able to, but there was nothing past that. Phantom superpower syndrome sucked. So much for being able to walk in to the PRT and go to Arcadia. I penciled harassing Clockblocker into my to-do list anyway. His reactions were always hilarious.

"Why would you do that?" I asked once I was standing again.

They both blinked at me.

"No seriously, that's technically assault. What if one of the neighbors called that in?"

"Is poor widdle Taylor going to tattle to the cops on us?" said Sophia in baby-talk.

I rolled my eyes. "Look, if you really want a fight picking it the street is just dumb. Jump me in a back alley or something. This is just... sloppy."

The both blinked again.

I shook my head. "I'm out of here. Give me a call if you decide to be a human being again Emma, I owe you that much for helping me after my Mom died."

As I walked away I could just hear Sophia trying to get Emma to explain why I thought I was a big enough deal to say something like that and just walk away.

I smiled to myself. The fastest way to solve a problem was to hit it as hard as you could once it stopped playing nice. Warn once, sure, but after that give lessons about why being a problem was stupid. I'd learned that my very first night out from Lung. They just had their warning. Given how terrible Sophia was at playing nice, well, it was good to pass the lesson on even if it wouldn't stick after the reset.

It was handy that I had plenty of practice at hitting problems then.

* * *

3.9 (Zulaq)

Taylor Woke while she was setting up a tent. That was a unusual activity for her to Awake doing, but she quickly figured that this was probably some variant loop.

Then she received her pre-loop memories. This wasn't a variant loop, it was a merged loop.

She was Taylor Hebert, an aspiring Pokémon Trainer and a decent human psychic, just setting out on her Pokémon journey.

Unfortunately, Sophia and Emma had apparently sabotaged her so she didn't get the psychic-type starter which had been lined up for her, and instead got a Weedle.

Taylor shrugged, she could work with that.

A couple weeks of intensive training, traveling and Pokémon catching later, Taylor walked up to the entrance to the Pewter City Gym.

Entering the building, she was greeted by a receptionist sitting at a computer underneath a TV showing an empty Pokémon battlefield, "Welcome, are you here to challenge the Gym Leader?" she asked with a polite smile on her face.

"Yes."

"Ok, I'll need your name, home town, and how many badges you already have."

"Taylor Hebert of Pallet Town, and I don't have any badges yet."

The woman's smile faded a bit, and she paused "No badges?" she fixed her smile and started typing at her computer, "Alright, well step on through, the Gym Leader will be with you shortly."

"Ok," With that Taylor passed through the next set of doors and found herself in a decent sized arena. Taking her position at one end, she waited for the others.

A pair of doors on the far side of the arena opened, and through them stepped a red-headed teenaged boy wearing white.

He stepped up to the other end of the arena, not really paying any attention to Taylor, and a podium containing a couple of Pokeballs came up from the floor beside him. "Alright, I'm Dennis, the Gym Leader of Pewter City, since this is your first Gym battle, I'll only be using two Pokémon, while you have an-," He paused as he actually looked at her.

Dennis' face paled and he began swearing, before catching himself and stuttering, "T-Taylor!?"

"Yep."

"Please tell me you're not Awake."

Taylor put her hands on her hips, "Can't do that, sorry."

"Darn. Give me a minute." He turned to the podium containing the two Pokeballs. He tapped a couple of controls on it and it receded for a moment before coming back up with six balls on it.

Taylor raised her eyebrow.

"Screw the rules, I know you, so I'm not going to use my one-badge team. I don't hate my Pokémon enough for that," Dennis explained, "I'm going to go all out, and maybe, just maybe, you won't walk all over me."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence." Taylor was actually kind of flattered by his apparent terror at her ability.

Dennis closed his eyes, took a deep breath, before getting into a battle stance, Pokeball clutched in his hand. "I know I'm going to regret this, but let's get this started. GO! Slaking!"

Taylor smiled reached down to her belt and brought out her own Pokeball. "Go, Beedrill!"

Dennis paled even further, "Fuck."

* * *

3.10 (Giygas)

Today was the day. The one Armsmaster both dreaded and waited for a lot of time.

Leviathan was going to attack Brockton Bay, and he was going to pass to history as the first cape to destroy an endbringer.

While such and similiar toughts crossed Colin mind, Legend started his pre-endbringer battle speech. Or at least tried to, because an infernal screech suddently resounded in the room, before becoming a buzzing voice: "Do not worry about the Endbringer, i will handle it."

Armsmaster recognized immediately the voice: how couldn't he know the voice of Skitter, the so called "Insectile Savior of Brockton Bay", a master/trump capable of controling insects and give mighty powers to them? All the gangs of the city literally disappeared within the first month she was active and the docks were completely rebuilt and fixed by her bugs! But defeating an Endbringer? Armsmaster felt pity for the young and clearly delusional cape.

And then he felt dread, because Dragon was warning that a poweful tidal wave was going to hit his town in the next few seconds.

In the last few months, seeing titanics bugs around the city was a very common occurence for everyone who lived in Brockton Bay. What wasn't common was definitively the titanic bug wall seemingly protecting the city from the ocean. But what could a group of bugs could do to stop a tidal wave? The correct answer was apparently a lot: for when the powerful wave hit the wall of insects, a mighty shield sprung from their bodies, blocking without any effort the water and repelling it back in the ocean.

But then a furious Leviathan suddently jumped from the water, clearly intent to destroy the pathetic bugs which stopped the destruction of his target. Only for the same shield to appear, blocking every single attempt of Leviathan to destroy the floating insects.

But the bugs weren't simply blocking Leviathan attacks: slowly but surely most insects were retreating, drawing Leviathan in the mainland. And then the area around the endbringer lost all of its light, the only colors coming from the gleaming claws of the bugs: too late the endbringer understood that he was being led into a trap.

After the furious attack of the shedinjas, nothing remained of the destroyer of Islands.

* * *

3.11 (Rex)

"Everyone ready for this?" My voice was tight over the radio. I had been planning this for centuries. And for the first time in forever everyone that I needed was awake and informed of the plan without my or their powers being different. A chorus of confirmations came over the sub-dermal comms.

"Right then. Let's go." I stood up from my perch above the street that my targets were parading down. I turned up the volume on my broadcasting unit, opened my mouth, and began to sing.

"Let's get down to business

To murder those guys

Come then house of slaughter

I could use some fun"

I ducked down after the first lines and dashed to the left, creating a host of bug clones to distract Jack. Attempts 10-25 had ended prematurely thanks to his damn knife. I broadcast through a bug clone on the opposite side of the street.

"You're the saddest bunch I ever met

But you can bet

Before we're through

Villains, I'll make a corpse out of you."

It belted out it's lines even as it was torn to shreds. Time for step three. This was the first real test for this run. I could do all of my parts perfectly, but when other people got involved it tended to fall apart. Fortunately, this time everyone I needed was awake and practiced. Time for their cues.

"Tranquilize a Cherish

Quench the fire within

Once we slay your center

We are sure to win"

Thwip, thwip. Two darts flung by Dragon's remote drone, tinker designed sedative could even bypass Bonesaw's countermeasures. Burnscar had been flinging fire around in her usual pattern, but Brian had swamped her with darkness before setting off the containment foam mines placed at the location of her next teleport. Swarms of bugs formed arrows pointed towards Jack and dived bombed him. The Siberian kept close to Jack and Bonesaw keeping them safe even as the bugs began exploding. I smiled as I began my next verse. I did so love knowing things my opponents didn't.

"You're a spineless, pale, pathetic lot.

And you haven't got a clue.

Right now, I'll make a corpse out of you."

And that was when everything started to really go wrong for poor old Jack. Sure, the attack wasn't going well for him so far, but he hadn't lost anything important. But then the Siberian disappeared as Manton experienced every single one of his nerves burning themselves out within 30 seconds. I loved Amy's assassin bugs, they killed everything so well. We hadn't managed to design one that could kill Scion yet, but I'm sure we can manage it eventually. So not only did Jack lose his best defensive member, he also had to deal with Shatterbird trying to shred him and Riley with her glass. And then somebody besides the crazy bug girl started singing.

"Shatterbird: I'm never gonna make a move.

Tattletale: say goodbye to those who knew you.

Riley: boy was I a fool in school for cutting gym."

Regent's power could carry over between loops. This eventually made dealing with most opponents a cake walk in loops when he was awake. And part of the reason I was so confident that the tranquilizer that took out Cherish would bypass Bonesaw's work is that lovely little looping Riley was the one that gave it to us. Silly Siberian and your protecting the person that hates you most in the world. I suppressed a giggle. This was going so damn well!

"Dragon: These guy's got 'em scared to death.

Imp: Hope he doesn't slice right through you.

Shatterbird: Now I really wish that I could move a limb."

Dragon provided color commentary for the Protectorate and Wards that served as our back up for this operation. I flinched at Imp's interjection. Partially because I had honestly thought I had somehow forgotten a line in the middle of the song, partially because she had decided to do it right into my ear instead of after taking down Mannequin like she was supposed to. I wanted to shout at her, but it was time for the chorus.

"To make a corpse

We must be smart as the floating Simurgh.

to make a corpse

With all the force of Leviathan.

to make a corpse

With all the strength of a mad Behemoth

Send everyone to the inside of the morgue."

All of the loopers and Shatterbird joined in for this one. Clockblocker alone would have gotten a massive punishment for the verse, but with Armsmaster, Flechette, Miss Militia, Vista, Dragon, and Kid Win joining in everyone would get off lightly. I covered for Imp's negligence by webbing up Mannequin during the chorus. It wasn't like any of the nine were a threat to us, but the song called for proper timing and I didn't want to wait another century and a half for another opportunity.

"Time is racing towards us

Till Bonesaw's swan dive

Heed my every order

And you will survive."

Riley obligingly stumbled over my spider's triplines and disappeared underneath Grue's darkness. With her own augments and the pull from Atlas, she was evacuated to the far side of a buildings roof long before Jack could do anything. I kept him busy with more exploding bugs as I landed on the rooftop opposite her. Assuming Jack didn't come up with anything clever I had won. This next verse was just a bit of theatre for the unawakened members of the audience.

"You're unsuited for

My rage of war

So pack up, come home, you're through

Why would I make a Corpse out of you."

A bit of cowering away from the approaching villain cloaked in buzzing swarms of the worlds scariest insects. Tears and a panicked face as she is backed into the corner. Followed by an emotional breakdown and a desperate hug as the swarms dispersed in favor of a small flock of butterflies as I extended my arms for a hug. And thus enough sympathy was generated that the Undersiders didn't get slapped with a kill order for openly accepting Bonesaw into their ranks. This time, she joined in with the chorus.

"To make a corpse

We must be smart as the floating Simurgh

to make a corpse

With all the force of Leviathan

to make a corpse

With all the strength of a mad Behemoth

Send everyone to the inside of the morgue."

Jack's last desperate throes matched the ending of the last note. I could have killed him at pretty much any point during the song, but timing was more important than efficiency in this case.

I did it! I won! One more step along the path to turning a full loop into a musical. A rather manic laugh threatened to burst forth from my chest. Dear gods how bored had I been when I came up with that life goal? And how bored were we that everyone else agreed to pursue it?

Oh well. I turned my mike back down to normal levels and tapped it twice to switch it to link broadcast instead of public.

"Good job everyone. This production of 'Slaughterhouse Nine vs. the Jitterbug' has been a rousing success. I'll take the bounty payments in cash if you please. A nice round 500 million I believe." I forced myself to speak in a light chirpy voice. Jitterbug, with her paired powers of arthropodkinesis and extreme competence boost while singing about what she was doing couldn't have the scary persona of Skitter. It was bad PR.

"Jitterbug, your bounty only goes to 420 million. Crawler is still active."

"What?" Dammit, I knew I'd been forgetting something. And that's when Crawler burst through the floor and sent me hurtling over the edge. As I fell I decided that this was cool enough to keep as a permanent feature of the Jitterbug musical. Hmmm, If Crawler got upgraded to his own song should I stick to the Disney theme for the last member of the Slaughterhouse Nine or do something along the lines of a reprise for Lung's fight song?

* * *

3.12 (Lucky777)

Today I decided I was going to be a Tinker. Obviously, I don't actually have the shard necessary to qualify as one but over the many many many years I obtained enough knowledge that faking being one would be easier than taking out Lung. What to pick as my speciality? The loop where I made robots are always fun and while creating another AI would make Dragon happier than sunshine I wanted to do something new. Something delightfully entertaining and disastrous. I looked at the school book in my hands then at the words then back at the book.

I smirked when an idea came to my head.

"The letters!" yelled Legend. "They're moving off the surface" Hundreds of thousands of individual letters were floating about. Computer screens were devoid of words, books with empty pages were the only ones to be seen. Thousands of people were screaming at their computer screen as their fanfictions floated away undoing their entire work.

"Any idea of what might be causing this?" replied Eidolen.

"Must be a new parahuman." said Alexandria. "Nobody I know of can cause this... well except maybe Contessa but she doesn't count"

"We need to alert the government and gather our thinkers, this looks like it has the potential to become a S rank threat" said Legend.

At home I watched on the T.V. as news spread about my new device, the word peeler. Cackling I listened in as my dad received a call from school saying how it has been shut down due to the "uncertainty" of the situation. I smiled that's one way to stop going to school.

I should also probably stop making giant pictures of spaceships in the sky with the letters, Vista might not like it.

* * *

3.13 (Rex)

I awoke to the sound of my dad's voice.

"Taylor, honey, there's a girl on the phone for you. She says her name is Lisa. Is she one of your friends from school?"

I responded with an eloquent and finely crafted lie, refined over several centuries to the peak of perfection.

"Mmn z'yea zh'se af rii"

Why Lisa felt the need to call me this early in the morning at the start of a loop was beyond me.

"Okay then." My dad responded, fond amusement clear in his voice. "I'll let you two talk. If you need anything I'll be downstairs. Remember today's Waffle Day!"

I nodded and mumbled an affirmative at dad as he handed me the phone and left the room. Something was bothering me about the whole exchange, but I was to sleepy to put my finger on it. I cradled the phone, which seemed to have grown about six sizes when I wasn't looking and spoke to my best friend that I most certainly would not cover in spiders for waking me up this early.

"Was iz it?" Clearly, this loop had started the day after a very entertaining night. I hadn't slurred my words this much since Imp's first 21st birthday. I swear she spent the entire party spiking every collection of liquid in a six block radius.

"Taylor." Lisa answered me and I was suddenly much more awake. Her voice was much too high pitched and she was speaking in her calmly controlled manner that meant shit was fucked and she wasn't part of the problem. "Why am I a prepubescent fucking seven year old!?"

The phone slipped from my fingers and fell about two feet less than it was supposed to before it impacted on my pajama clad feet.

* * *

3.14 (The_One_Butcher)

The giant mass of bugs stomped to the massed defenders until finally it stood face to face with Armsmaster.

Then it spoke. An eerie scratching and chittering and humming and buzzing, that finally coalesced into words. It was a moment both disturbing and historical.

"Human! I am Queen Administrator, a Shardling, the Fourth of those you call Endbringers."

That Confirmed the suspicions, the fears, the horror that was felt by everyone in Brockton Bay.

Still, since when did Endbringers Talk? It was an unique opportunity.

"What do you want? And how come you can talk?" Armsmaster yelled defiantly.

"We Shardlings have evolved since the Beginning, Walking Rock was the first to function." Armsmaster noted the name and forwarded a recording to one of Dragons high security datacenters. Every piece of information could reveal a weakness. "She studied all that lives and how the water on this planet stifles all that burns so the next was made from what he learned: Imitation of Life, patterned after the primitive life forms."

So, Behemoth is a Girl? He could have lived without that information.

"She studied Humanity, how they reacted, how they communicated and prepared for the future. This was used in the creation of my own Mother: Seer and Mastermind, the first to truly understand how humans work."

Okay, each Endbringer is the child of the one before it. That's a much better reason they call themselves "she". Could that mean that if they killed the newest one no other would follow? It's a slim hope they can't simply have a second child, but it was A hope. Still, Behemoth the "first to function", there could very well be a number of hidden invalid Endbringers capable of reproducing somewhere.

"She manipulated them to great effect and studied humanities greatest powers: Organisation and Cooperation. I am the culmination of that effort. Queen Administrator, Lady of cooperation. So I want to cooperate with you. We can come to a mutually beneficially agreement. The High Priest, The Locked One and the Prince of Light, those you call Triumvirate, they will found a city. In it you will assemble all the most powerful Shardblessed once every three months." A mouth opened up and showed a grin made of Nightmares.

"And then we will fight. And there will be none of your precious Civilians in the way. But if not enough Shardblessed come or you cannot put up a good fight, well, the other three Shardlings will each wipe out a random settlement in a hit and run. My... Ancestors might disagree with this agreement, but if the High Priest refuses to fight them anywhere but there, they will come to see reason. Seer and Mastermind will see that you refuse to put up a fight anywhere else and will redirect the others. Now..."

With that the mass of Bugs flew forward into the massed heroes. Hundreds were felled, but none died. Dragon exterminated great swathes of them with fire until her suit was smashed against a steel girder with the help of spider silk and pulleys. In the End only four defenders stood, using giant dogs wrapped in dark clouds to smash a crane turned Bug-Zapper into the last conglomeration of Bugs, which fled.

Construction of the new Parahuma-only city, Hero's Stand(Unofficially called Endbringer's Bait) began shortly after.

* * *

3.15 (nocarename)

Occasionally it's a pain that the Federation keeps their ships so clean. The only way I would be able to pull together a swarm would be to raid the main bio labs, and they were simply too far away. Also I didn't have the authorization codes.

Instead I rushed the attacking Cardassian. Taking a phaser from someone isn't much different from taking any other hand gun - with the added bonus that it's harder for their friends to shoot through your opponent and hit you. A few seconds of scuffling and a headbutt had me armed and diving back behind the minimal cover of the nearest intersection.

"Ensign Hebert, I see you've signed up for Lieutenant Commander Worf's general self defense training program. An excellent choice if you're going to keep finding yourself in these situations," said the Captain's voice. I glanced over to where it had come from to see Captain Picard, his jacket slightly open, and looking far too comfortable for someone having a running gun battle in his own ship. I suppose we were pretty close to his quarters.

I probably looked too comfortable too. In my defense, it really was less stressful that sitting on my hands unable to help when the ship as a whole fought.

"Well, I couldn't just leave them alone Sir," I said over the sound of Cardassian return fire, "The Enterprise is a large ship. They could get lost."

"Quite right. Now, let's go welcome them aboard. Thoroughly."

-0-

"Sometimes I wish I knew where Ensign Hebert came from," said Commander Riker to his friend Lieutenant Commander Data as they worked to restore the main computer, and incidentally end the boarding situation in a single stroke, "And then I look at her holodeck scenarios."

"The 'Wards and Warlords of the Bay' has proved quite popular," commented Data.

"As a horror scenario. I'm pretty sure that Miss Hebert is the basis for one of the characters."

Data cocked his head to one side, his hands still flashing through repositioning isolinear chips inside a wall panel. "That would be awkward to bring up," he agreed finally.

"Well, your understatement is still a wonder Mister Data."

"Thank-you Sir. Re-initiating computers now."


	4. Chapter 4

4.1 (The_One_Butcher)

Armsmaster summarized: "Today at eleven hundred Lung and his Gang show up suddenly in our containment cells. While we are still looking for the Teleporter who's done that the Simurgh is hit by some kind of beam and explodes. Then a Tinker Vessel claiming to be the Starship Enterprise crash-lands in the Bay and started to broadcast: "Don't mind us, we aren't even here. Really, look the other way, we've got a Prime Directive to keep. Our course is clear: We will give the Credit for the capture, the Endbringer Kill and the Enterprise to Leet."

"Wait, WHAT?" Director Piggot looked at Armsmaster as if he lost his mind. Well, he did, quite a number of Loops ago, but he thinks he's more stable now than before.

"It's easy really. If it's Leet we'll seem informed. If it's not, well it was just a clever strategy to draw out the real Hero, because no Tinker in this world will want his work to be associated with that bozo. Also it's just geeky enough to be him. If he build a powerful matter reassembler able to teleport things and even destroy Endbringers, he totally would pack it into the Enterprise."

At that point Piggot pressed the Master/Stranger Button under her desk with her toe. Because either Armsmaster has really gone insane with envy or there was someone controlling him. Armsmaster seemed different these last months, first she thought it was just his relationship with Dragon, but there was clearly more at work.

Armsmaster, whose Visor informed him of the Button Press just thought:"Not again... Maybe I should get acting lessons..."

* * *

4.2 (The_One_Butcher)

"Her Name is Massive.", Miss Militia explained to Armsmaster, "She's supernaturally proficient with any weapon she touches, from a knife to a scramjet. She triggered yesterday and proceeded to kill Lung with a pebble. You will build her something nonleathal and you will work together with Dragon and Flechette to give her something with maximum penetration."

"And... Why?"

"Because.", the new cape said, "When I hold a projectile weapon and look at pictures of Endbringers there's always one specific tiny little spot I want to shoot. And it's not where something else might traditionally keep it's brain."

"So..."

"Hit it's Weak Spot for Massive Damage."

"It seems you have a Massive Problem Bakuda." Clockblocker groaned. Really, that girl would be a really good addition to the team. If it weren't for that awful pun...

"Ouch," She gloated to the downed Tattletale, "Seems like you will have a Massive headache in the Morning."

"Man, Piggot gave me a Massive amount of Paperwork for that Joke..."

"Jack Slash! I have killed Leviathan and the Simurgh! You are just a little worm due some Massive retribution!

"Oh, I seem to have a Massive Problem." Scion said, prompting Kid Win to shoot at him and hitting Massive instead, whose lower body disintegrated.

Her last words were: "You Massive fool..."

* * *

4.3 (The_One_Butcher)

"Taylor?", Danny asked his daughter, "I found this Bachelor's certificate under your bed. I never knew you took university courses in Biology... And now that I asked at the University they tell me you also have a Master's and are currently working on your promovation? So you're some kind of super-Genius and didn't even tell me?"

"Eh, I wanted to wait and surprise you with my PhD. I mean, what would be more awesome, "Hey Dad, I tested out of High School!" or "It's Doctor Hebert, thank you very much!"

Her father looked at her with a dumbfounded look. Then he sank to his knees. "I don't even know my own daughter anymore..."

Taylor frowned. "Somehow that's not the reaction a father should have to find out his daughter is getting a PhD..."

Danny snapped his head up. "Er... yes, Taylor... I am disappointed you didn't tell me you tested out of high school, but I am very proud of you. I am mostly disappointed in myself that I didn't notice. I must have been a horrible father since... Anyway, you graduated High School and got two degrees! I say we're eating out for the next three days!"

Taylor smiled. She completely forgot how much she loved her father in the last few Millennia. The whole "Doctor Bees!" thing could wait.

* * *

4.4 (The_One_Butcher)

* Topic: The Next Attack. In: BoardsWorld NewsMain Simurgh (Original Poster)(Moderator) (Veteran Member) (Confirmed Endbringer)

Posted on April 16th, 2011:

You guys got any Suggestions?

(Showing Page 127 of 127)

Simurgh (Original Poster) (Moderator) (Veteran Member) (Confirmed Endbringer)

Replied on April 16th, 2011:

Those are all basically "NOT HERE!" Booooring... I hoped you'd give me some good ideas! I was hoping for some experienced locals listing reasons why their town would be a good target.

I'm thinking China. There's a really funny chain-reaction when I kill... Ah, Spoilers, but trust me, it's going to be hilarious!

Lev might hit North America first though, I set him up with a Date there. I'm a little anxious about it though... her future's a little hazy lately, damn Alcott brat...

* Topic: Ziz's : BoardsSite NewsMain Bagrat (Original Poster) (Veteran Member) (The Guy in the Know)

Posted on April 16th, 2011:

Tinmother has given the long term Troll and often banned but always somehow recreated account "Simurgh" Moderator status, Veteran Member and the badge (Confirmed Endbringer). The question is: Are you Insane?

(Showing Page 1 of 15)

Tinmother (Moderator)

Replied on April 16th, 2011:

I found a way to finally ban her in a way her constant hacking of the site couldn't reverse. Next thing I know my house was on fire and a meteor exploded my car. My laptop mysteriously survived and a swarm of cockroaches jumping from the roof onto the keyboard entered the address of a website for speculation about the next Endbringer attack on a topic called "your ass".

Simurgh (Moderator) (Veteran Member) (Confirmed Endbringer)

Replied on April 16th, 2011:

I might need a sockpuppet account, because now it's too easy.

* * *

4.5 (The_One_Butcher)

I wonder why I never did this before... I could have done this at any time after that Dragonball Loop...

"So..." Armsmaster asked the new Heroine in her red and blue outfit. "Your name is..."

"Supergirl!"

"Yeah, I was afraid of that..."

"So..." Armsmaster asked the new Heroine in her red and blue outfit. "Your name is..."

"Spidergirl!"

"Yeah, I was afraid of that..."

"So..." Armsmaster asked the new Heroine in her Black leather outfit. "Your name is..."

"Batgirl."

"Yeah, I was afraid of that..."

"So..." Armsmaster asked the new Heroine in her Black leather outfit. "Your name is..."

"Catwoman."

"Yeah, I was afraid of that..."

"So..." Armsmaster asked the new Heroine in her Brown leather outfit. "Your name is..."

"Squirrelgirl!"

"Yeah, I was afraid of that..."

"So..." Armsmistress asked the new Hero in his red and blue outfit. "Your name is..."

"Spiderman."

"Yeah, I was afraid of that..."

"So..." Armsmaster asked the new Heroine in her red and blue outfit. "Your name is..."

"Captain America!"

"Yeah, I was afraid of that..."

"It's Unisex!"

"So..." Weaver asked the new Hero in his Black outfit. "Your name is..."

"Batman."

The Leader of the BBP considered the Teenage Hero. "Actually, that's really fitting. Good call Colin."

"WHAT? How do you know my name?"

...

On second thought, her loop memories don't contain any Batman Comics. "So you're not Awake?"

"What do you mean? Am I not talking to you?"

"Eh... No, one of my lesser known powers acting up. It's suggesting an apprenticeship with Dragon. I'm sure I can get you one."

To see Arms... Batman look that ecstatic is a rare sight. Mainly I want Dragon to collect a lot of footage of Colin as a teenage Batman.

* * *

1.11 cont (Rex)

"You must understand, Undersiders, I do not use fear as Lung did, or manipulation as Kaiser does. I would have you work alongside me because you know I am the person that is best equipped to provide what you desire, and that nobody else can or will give you a better offer. You, in turn, are the group best suited to forward my agendas."

Coil prattled on about his plans to take the city. I still remembered the anxiety I had felt the first time I rode in this car. Although I wonder if that would have been true if he had peppered his speech with quite so many little compliments and subtly praising turns of phrase. Sam really had been doing a number on him.

I could still see the old Coil in there. He was just as willing to kill and torture and blackmail to get his way. Still kept that old preference for being the devil that people made deals with. However, that devil had apparently decided to adopt a couple of kids and turned into a doting grandfather whenever they were involved.

To be honest, it was a little creepy. Especially when I remembered one of his kinks I had discovered from when I hadn't learned that constant surveillance of absolutely everyone in my range wasn't necessary. Getting a bullet to the back of the head courtesy of Contessa or the Number Man was still preferable to accidently listening to Squealer and Skidmark.

"Skitter," Coil spoke, interrupting my thoughts. "I came prepared, tonight, with offers in mind for the rest of your team. I can help care for Bitch's collections of rescued dogs, and help ensure less animals need rescue in the future. Grue is relying on me for a personal matter, and he knows that my taking power can only ensure that things go his way without difficulty. Delphi was already informed of my plans the same as Tattletale and has given me the terms of her allegiance. You and you alone, Skitter, have me wondering what you desire at the end of things."

Tattletale, to my left, leaned forward again, interest clear on her face.

I had to be convincing. No way was I going to let something slip past the radar and alert Tattletale now. Loops where she figured out that I had heard this offer before tended to damage my friendships with the rest of the group and that caused all sorts of difficulties down the line. So I maintained my occlumency to the highest degree I could manage and gave serious thought to what I wanted out of this loop.

I decided to be honest with Coil for once.

"I value the safety of my friends and family, humanity in general, and myself, in that order. The other gangs, the drugs, the poverty they all get in the way of that. I joined up with the Undersiders because I was looking for a group of friends I could have fun with. We were going to end up trying to eliminate all the other forces in town eventually, so if you can cut out half the problems and take up the burden of actually running a city then that's fine by me. My price is that you play it straight with me and mine. Do that, and I'll destroy every obstacle in the path of that shiny golden future." I finished speaking and kept my head firmly focused towards Coil. In truth, I was looking through my bugs' eyes to gauge the reaction of not only him, but also Sam and Tattletale.

Sam was staring into space, fiddling with the end of the spider silk bandanna wrapped over her eyes. She didn't need to give any indication of where her attention was focused, so for all I knew she was inspecting the winning numbers of next month's lottery. I'd tried to emphasize the importance of friendship and the protection thereof but I wasn't sure if it had sunk in the way I wanted.

Tattletale was giving me a look. It was her 'She actually meant that, has the power to follow through with what she said, and despite the fact that I should find this comforting I feel as though I should be suffering some sort of existential crisis' face. Tattletale could display some very complex expressions and I had eventually learned to read them exceedingly well. It was so hard to get a straight answer out of her about her emotions otherwise. This face in particular was familiar to me because she tended to show it whenever I announced my intentions to do something that was well outside of what she thought I could accomplish but her power told her I believed to be a foregone conclusion.

I secretly relished every opportunity I had to see that look on her face. I not so secretly relished the face she displayed after I had proved my beliefs correct. Shocked and admiring awe was somehow so very appealing on Lisa.

Coil shook his head in reply to my demands, "Not something I can really offer in good conscience, Miss Skitter.."

He raised his hand to stop me before I could open my mouth. Not that I was going to, but he did. "What you're asking for, I already intended to do. To give it to you as a gift would be little different than offering you an amount in cash, when I already intend to give you as much money as you require."

"So you're going to improve Brockton Bay, and keep your employees safe?" I said, carefully.

"Don't get me wrong. I will not claim to be a good person – I assure you I am not. That said, you are likely to discover I am a proud man. I would consider it a catastrophic failure on my part if this city and its people did not thrive under our rule, a tremendous blow to my ego."

I nodded. He would and had been quite upset about that sort of thing, in timelines where I had arranged for such. The implication that he would be sharing the power was a new twist. Sam's direct work, or merely because his precious precog wasn't a drug addict this time? Note to self: investigate conditions necessary to make Dinah work for Coil voluntarily. Coil tended to provide challenges over the widest number of loops following the same scenario, but always got screwed over by Dinah and the more long term consequences of his decisions. Without those problems he could start being an obstacle again in some of my less explored routes.

Coil continued, "Our desires on individual subjects may differ, however. I would argue there will always be crime, always be drugs, always be some sort of danger for you and your team to face."

"I'm not saying there won't. I'm just saying that there's room for improvement. When I was in grade six, more of my classmates could explain what a K-hole was than name a dozen countries. And it would get boring without a little bit of risk."

"I cannot promise quick fixes, Skitter. What I will tell you is that individuals like yourselves would control territories and be responsible for maintaining your own kind of order in those areas, with whatever means you saw fit. Over time, people would adjust to this, crime rates would decrease. I would simultaneously be controlling the flow of product into the city, reducing the distribution of most drugs, while making other, more benign product available in their place. Crime and drugs cannot be conquered, but they are animals I believe I can tame."

"And the city itself?" I read from my mental script. His delivery and word choice was just different enough that I felt the need to pay attention, but not enough for me to improvise new lines when the old ones worked so well, "Fixing the ferry?"

"Yes. Rest assured, if you were to accept my offer, I would want you to contact me and speak up at any time you felt I was not following through in any department. I want this city to be our shining jewel. I might be a proud man, but I would rather you injure that pride, even provoke it intentionally, rather than let me be complacent."

I nodded once, slowly.

"I have said my piece, then. I leave you to consider it, Undersiders. I recognize that this is not what you signed on for, in the beginning. I know it might not have the same appeal in the scope of costumed hijinks, and I'm prepared for the fact that that this might lead you to refuse this offer. All I hope is that if you do refuse me, if you decide you are more comfortable as simple uncommon criminals, that our prior arrangement will stand."

"You've invested this much in us, and if we say no, we can just walk away?" Regent asked him.

Coil spread his hands a bit, "What would you see me do, Regent? Murder you? Threaten you? Orchestrate an arrest? All of my most valuable information assets are on this team. Any attempt on my part is almost guaranteed to fail, and you may count it as a compliment that I would not want any of you escaping the attempt and coming after me as a dedicated adversary. If one of you were to turn traitor on the rest and I could count on the rest of your support to help me eliminate them, then yes, maybe I would succeed on those counts, but I'd much prefer to keep you all as friends."

He knocked on the window behind him. Immediately, the limousine slowed down and pulled over. As I glanced outside, I saw we were in the Docks.

"Think on the subject. Discuss it and get back to me with your reply, the sooner the better, and please no later than a week from now. Tattletale, Delphi, it should be obvious, but I formally free you from all stipulations in your contract requiring you to keep my identity as your sponsor private. You may give my contact information to your teammates."

"Sure thing," Tattletale replied. Sam nodded distractedly alongside her.

"And before I forget, I arranged individual accounts for each of you with a supervillain banker by the name of The Number Man, as paying for tonight's job in bills, naturally, was unfeasible. My men will provide you with your account information and the instructions for accessing these accounts as you retrieve your dogs."

Grue extended a hand, "I'm not sure what we'll do, whether we'll take this deal, but it's been good working with you thus far, and I hope to continue."

Coil took Grue's hand and shook it, firm, "Likewise, Grue, Undersiders. I hope you have an excellent evening and look forward to hearing from you." He nodded his head at Sam as we exited his limousine. As we collected the last of the dogs and Coil's Limousine drove away, Tattletale turned from where she had been staring at the limo the entire time the rest of us were attending to Bitch's dogs.

"Guys, we might have a slight problem." She said, crossing her arms across her chest. "Coil had us as his expendable force, he was a literal psychopath and didn't have an actual care for us at all. But he meant every single word he said in the car and is almost starting to consider himself paternal towards us."

"The first part's annoying, and the last bit's kinda creepy, but I'm failing to see how the boss liking us is a problem." Regent drawled in response. I could understand his sentiments, anyone coming off paternal was a problem as far as Regent was concerned, and Coil was not a good pick.

"Because unless somebody was fucking with his head, there's no way he would be that concerned about anyone. That isn't the man that hired us."

Oops.

I suppressed my desire to glare at Sam.

* * *

4.6 (The_One_Butcher)

The Heroes stood in silent vigil, waiting for the new Endbringer to show herself. Armsmaster, whose living room and workshop was destroyed every time the Simurgh attacked, each time in more and more improbable coincidences, hefted his new halberd. Speculation on the new and improved Endbringer had run rampant for these last two months. Armsmaster had prepared for a possible Tinker-Endbringer. His loadout was ready for all kinds of Electronic disrupting and metalworking. He had a second Halberd ready, should it become necessary to destroy lots of small fireproof robots, a logical next step. Dragon was going to go for concussive blasts, acids and nanofilament-cutters. She was preparing for something like Nilbog, a hoarde of custom but biological Monsters.

Which was when Administrator rose over the Horizon.

"Witness." an eldritch whisper came from a small mass of bugs that had snuck up on them. "The birth of a shardling."

A hurried conversation came through the wire. "Should we try to interfere? If Administrator has a Main body it could be there. Maybe we can interrupt their reproductive cycle and make sure there are no new Endbringers, ever!"

"I don't detect anything but the usual bugs. A high concentration, yes forming a dome." Dragon intervened. "Also it might jeopardize this tenuous arrangement with the Endbringers. Deaths to Endbringers are a rarity nowadays, the Economy recovered. We cannot risk it."

"But," Armsmaster countered, "the Endbringers are learning, improving themselves. They become ever stronger and better. We are fighting a delaying action, while time is on their side!"

"Politics. Orders from above. Also the Triumvirate and the PRT seems to think that humanity gains in power faster than the shardlings. While they do learn, they do so only slowly and sluggishly. We'll see today if we can afford to wait. It seems a low risk experiment to them, while breaking the "second truce" bears risk right now, which to them seems a lot more dire."

The Dome solidified and a muted flash shone through it. Then it dispersed. A cry of anguish rose over the Battlefield as they beheld the fearsome form of...

...

Hello? I said a cry of anguish rose over the Battlefield! Hey! Why aren't you covering in fear?

Well... Okay, there was a silence instead.

There was a silence instead, as the Heroes waited for the other shoe to drop. Then finally there were cries of anguish, which through a trick of the acoustics of the Battlefield sounded suspiciously like incredulous laughter.

"Uhm, Hi. My... my name is Fluttershy. And... I'm gonna be your Endbringer today... If you don't mind that is..." The horrible Monstrosity shrunk into herself and Squeaked.

Casualties shot up, even as Dragon shouted over the com-link.

"THE NEW ENDBRINGER APPEARED! ACCORD, WE NEED TWO HUNDRED KILOGRAM OF INSULIN YESTERDAY!"

* * *

4.7 (misterq)

Taylor laughed as she flew off from the school roof. It was still amazing to her how well people treated a girl that rode around everywhere on the back of a giant bee - a girl who also carried several jars of bees in a bandoleer (bee-ndoleer?), and used a weapon consisting nothing more than a giant angrily buzzing burlap sack simply labeled 'BEE-IN BAG!'

Now it was just a matter to think of a good cape name.

Bee Keeper? Nope.

Queen Bee? Nah.

Honey Pot? Definitely no.

* * *

4.8 (The_One_Butcher)

Finally. When somehow all attempts at creating a distraction failed, Coil had to try and kidnap the Alcott brat one try at a time. Coil was just about to collapse the reality where he didn't kidnap his little pet when he slipped and mashed his face on the keyboard. He blacked out for a bit. When he came too he was covered in Cockroaches, which fell from a hole in his ceiling. He looked up in his safe reality, where there was no such hole and scooted his chair away. In the other reality he shook himself free from the roaches and looked at his screen.

In his wild flailing he somehow opened the Parahumans Online Board.

* Topic: The Next Attack. In: BoardsWorld NewsEndbringers Simurgh (Original Poster)

Posted on April 28th, 2011:

Your Ass.

USER WAS BANNED FOR THIS POST

(Showing Page 1 of 1)

Tinmother (Moderator)

Replied on April 28th, 2011:

I keep banning you! Why won't it work? Stop it!

The last two words were highlighted. He collapsed that reality and vowed to leave Dinah Alcott well alone.

* * *

4.9 (The_One_Butcher)

"Hello! I'm going to make you my minions!" Uber turned around to look at the UC which has somehow managed to sneak up on them.

"I don't think that's how it works." He said dryly and leveled his Diamond Sword(made of an extremely durable blue aluminum oxide crystal) at her.

"Oh, yes, that is how it works! Because I have the very best power and will use it to make you my minions!" The girl smiled at them brightly. "Come on, try to guess my power! It's going to be SO AWESOME on the Video." She coughed and intoned. "I will defeat you with my awesome Powers!"

Uber and Leet did love nothing so much as playing along. "You have Super Strength!"

The girl wipped on the balls of her feet. "Nope!"

"Flight?"

"Nope!"

"You're durable?"

"Nope!"

"You can shoot Lasers?"

"Nope!"

"You can make amazing gadgets."

"Nope!"

"You can use mind control?" "Nope!" "You have minions or other stuff you control?" "Nope!" "Telekinesis?" "Nope!" "You can perform any kind of special attack or defense?" "Nope!" "Do you know Kung Fu?"

The girl just smiled. "Not yet..."

They looked at each other in a practiced fashion and said in unison: "Then what can you do?"

"This! Game Saved." The Girl shuddered and looked up. "Urgh... Dammit! Well, this time I will dodge left and then I can finally defeat you!"

Uber and Leet let the implications sink in. "Oh fuck." It was a one sided beat down.

"My name is Player One." The two of them bowed deeply.

"We apologize Mistress, we didn't realize you were the Player One."

"Rise. You won't need to kneel ever again, because, together we will rule the world!" She declared defiantly to the heavens. "Game Saved!" With that she shuddered and slumped in defeat.

"Sadly I have still not managed to keep Scion from getting so bored he destroys the world. I think the Key is that we should NOT kill the Endbringers this time."

Uber and Leet paled even further. "I'll spend the next few subjective centuries psychoanalyzing the Endbringers..."

Player continued to have explosive mood swings each time she saved. It was justified, seeing as for her subjective years or Centuries passed each time. They always wondered weather they were in the final timeline or going to be wiped like RAM. One day that fear became dreadful reality.

"Game Saved. Fuck this, I'm taking a Vacation! I'm going to see weather or not I can get Panacea to make out with me and fix my eyesight during the Endbringer attack today. Go on, YOLO! I'm not keeping this timeline anyway.

Uber and Leet exchanged horrified glances.

* * *

4.10 (Zulaq)

"Lung just isn't a challenge anymore", she mused aloud to herself, "Maybe I should give him some more ramp-up time before breaking out insectizilla next time." Fighting a giant dragon using masses of insects formed into an even larger beast just didn't have the same appeal as it did the first time she pulled this trick.

With just a fraction of her focus, she directed the venomous insects which made up Insectizilla's 'hands' to bite Lung and deliver the payload of poison which she calculated would be enough to knock him out. Now she had about three minutes to prepare for Armsmaster's arrival, should she go with plan A, and offer to join the Protectorate as a Case 53 cape, or let Armsamster draw his own-

Slurp.

Darn, she was out of lemonade.

"Want another one?" A woman handed Taylor another drink from behind her.

"Thanks-" Only centuries of experience with Imp kept Taylor from jumping out of her chair. Instead, she calmly put the drink on the table next to her chair, while assessing the woman with her bugs without getting out of her chair.

The woman was white-haired, tall, well endowed, tanned and wearing an outfit which Taylor was certain would get her arrested for indecent exposure, if any cop could gather their wits at the woman's ethereal beauty. Oh, and she had appeared so suddenly that Taylor had had no warning whatsoever of her approach before she was handing her the drink.

Calmly, Taylor got out of her chair in order to face her visitor. As she looked at her with her own eyes, Taylor could tell that she had never come across this woman before, but the obvious look of recognition and assessment told her that this woman did know something about her. Then Taylor noticed the red markings on the woman's face, and she had to resist the urge to facepalm, she didn't want to deal with this right now.

"What's a goddess doing here? Urd told me you guys were going to stay away until my next fused loop."

The woman laughed, it was cheerful, but had an unnerving undertone. "I'm sure my daughter is keeping her promise. Although, she must be tearing her hair out at the idea of me being here and not being able to intervene because of it. She always does worry like that."

Taylor rubbed her temple. "I repeat, how is a goddess doing here?"

The woman frowned slightly, "I'm not a goddess, silly." She smiled once more. "I'm Hild, and I represent the other side-"

Tayor did not like the sound of that, but Hild continued to speak before she could interrupt.

"-And I'm here to fill you in on the details that my daughter probably missed."

"First off, Urd never mentioned having a mother," Taylor pointed out, "Second, what do you mean, you represent the other side?"

Hild gave a huff, arms on her hips "That is so like her, to forget her dear old mother. Just because I run Hell-"

Taylor froze.

"-And rule over all the demons-"

Taylor gaped.

"-doesn't mean she can get away with not introducing such an interesting friend to her mother."

Taylor regarded Hild with an extremely cautious gaze, and began assessing exactly what insects she had at her disposal. "What exactly does the leader of Hell want with me?"

"Oh, they just call me the Daimakaichō," Hild gave Taylor a slight dismissive hand wave, "It's more appropriate. And I just want to be your friend."

Taylor was quick to reply, "I have plenty of friends, thanks."

Hild gave another dismissive gesture, "You have plenty of mortal friends, and they don't even have a clue who you are most of the time. Why, I bet you've never even told them what you are even when they are awake."

Hild's face grew sad. "That's no way for someone to live, you need someone to be a true friend. Your mortal friends are a fine stopgap, but eventually you will lose your ability to really relate to them."

Taylor was quick to find a comeback, "What about the gods? Belldandy could make a great friend. I don't think I'm desperate enough to become besties with the devil."

Hild scowled. "The goddesses are the reason you're in this situation in the first place. If they had just done their jobs, then you wouldn't be reliving the same few years over and over again, and this world wouldn't be the hellhole it is. They want you to clean up their mess."

"And besides, they've already decided your future for you. That whole bit about 'We will welcome you as one of us', what they really mean is that you'll just become one of the many, many gods who run around at the whim of my husband, fixing brush fires and errors for eternity."

Taylor snorted, "And I suppose that you have some fancy counteroffer where I'll come work for you. Become one of your lackeys instead."

Hild laughed uproariously. "I've got plenty of minions already, I don't need another sycophant." Hild smiled conspiratorially at Taylor, "I'll tell you what, I'll play this straight, no lying, no deception, what I'm about to say is the absolute truth, I'd even put it in a contract."

Taylor braced herself, not believing the self-proclaimed devil for a moment, but remembering what Urd had told her about contracts and their inviolability.

"I want you to be my friend, plain and simple. There are so few beings who I meet who are not either one of my own, regard me as pure evil or totally unable to grasp the levels of reality I work on. In fact, there's all of one, and even He's as far above me as I am above a common mortal."

"The idea of having someone who can be friends with me is something I gave up on a long time ago, but in you I see the chance for someone who might be more than some business relationship, and it's intoxicating."

Taylor was about to reply, but Hild put a finger on her lips. "Shh, you don't have to make a decision now, we have eternity after all. I just wanted to meet you, and let you know my intentions." Hild turned around and started walking to the edge of the warehouse roof. "I'll be going now, but expect me to pop in every now and then."

She turned to face Taylor once more. "Bye." She blew a kiss at Taylor and waved her right hand, then vanished.

Taylor gradually lowered herself into her chair, she had a lot to think about.

* * *

4.11 (Zulaq)

Taylor Woke up in bed. As had become standard for her, she reviewed her in-loop memories for departures from her baseline.

It seemed that this loop was pretty much identical to her first time around, although she did have a different power than normal. Taylor shrugged, she'd gotten used to the loops throwing odd powers at her.

This time her power was…

Heat vision.

Ok. A bit more straight forward than her usual powers, but she could work with this.

And so the villians of Brocton Bay learned to fear the mighty heroine, Heat! She who's eyes of justice punished any crime she spotted.

Unfortunately, a month after she started the villains of the city decided to team up in order to stop her. And while Taylor was good, she didn't have the same situational awareness as she normally did, and was sniped by Victor.

Biomanipulation.

Alright, Taylor had to resist the urge to pump her fist, she had Pancea's power! Oh the things she could do with this…

Two weeks later Brocton Bay was abandoned as wave after wave of giant mutant beetles overwhelmed the city's heroes.

Elemental Transmutation

Currency manipulation isn't that bad a crime, Taylor wondered to herself, at least in her book. Sure, a little gold here and there, some speculation on the future value of certain hard-to-get materials, nothing too big.

It certainly didn't warrant the Birdcage, she thought to herself as she transmuted String Theory's arm into uranium at the Tinker's urging.

Therapeutic Punching

Really.

Her power was to make people saner by punching them.

Taylor honestly had no idea what she was going to do with that.

"Oh look, it's Taylor! It's a wonder she ever got out of the mental institution!"

I punched the girl who had made the comment. She started sobbing, but they weren't tears of pain.

"Oh my god! Taylor, I'm so sorry! Waaa! I'm such a terrible person!"

* * *

4.12 (The_One_Butcher)

"So your power is some kind of Pocket Dimension?" Alexandria Boggled.

"Yeah. I can put any nonliving thing into it. And apparently Endbringers don't count as alive."

"So when you just walked up to Leviathan..."

"I put him into my pocket. Boom, no Endbringer.. However there's a high probability that upon my death everything inside it will burst forth."

Alexandria cut her off. "Panacea will from now on spend all of her time with you. Shielders and Thinkers will guard you in shifts."

Pocket, such an unassuming name for the greatest Cape alive, smiled. "I should maybe check what he's doing."

Alexandria looked alarmed, so Taylor reassured her: "Don't worry, I won't have to open a portal or let him out for that. I can check completely safely." She closed her eyes.

"Oh fuck!" Taylor caused every near cape to nearly have a heart attack. "I forgot about the Afterimage!"

Alexandria tensed. "What will happen when your Pocket is full?" She hurried. "Will it burst? Will it explode violently? How much time do we have before he's freed?"

"Naw," Taylor said sadly, "I can just dump the water every forty hours or so. No chance of Leviathan escaping by accident during that. And it wouldn't explode, Leviathan would just crush himself."

She looked up with a crestfallen expression: "But now my lunch is all soggy..."

A few Loops later Taylor was shoved into the Locker... Only to have thirty Endbringers burst from it.

She made sure there were witnesses who, along with Sophia, miraculously survived. The newspaper titled "Grateful Endbringers honor local girl." with her Picture both in and out of mask was her new most prized posession.

Next time Sam was awake she would have her personally deliver a Mother's Day present for Sophia from each of them.

* * *

4.13 (bobbananaville)

"I don't get you." 'Twilight' glanced up at Rainbow Dash, confused by what the speedster said. "I mean, not you as in Twilight Sparkle, you as in 'Phantom Looper'. Why do you do that?"

"Um… Rainbow, what're you talking about?" The purple unicorn frowned, and Dash could have almost been convinced that she really didn't comprehend what Dash spoke of but for the nigh-imperceptible widening of her eyes. "I don't…"

"You don't have to keep the act up; I know you're looping; Twilight's the anchor, after all. You can go back to acting out her lines all you want later, but please just answer me: why do so many people like to take her place and act exactly as she would? Why do so many loopers like this ghosting thing?" At this point, Rainbow Dash noticed that her tone was becoming more insistent, and tried to tone down a bit. "I mean, y'know, if you're fine with telling me."

'Twilight Sparkle' didn't answer; her eyes were wide, and Rainbow started questioning whether this rendition of Twilight really was native to the loops - there had been quite a few loops wherein the non-looping Twilight existed, though the looping version of her always existed simultaneously. "Maybe I should just go back home and pretend that I didn't-"

"No!" The purple unicorn almost shouted. She quieted down before continuing. "No, don't do that. It's alright; I'm a ghost looper, yeah." Rainbow Dash sighed in relief, glad that she hadn't embarrassed herself by acting insane. "It's… Well, in my baseline, my life wasn't particularly great. I was bullied, and when I ended up with friends I still had trouble trusting them. I had trouble trusting anybody, actually." Her eyes were downcast now.

"Uh huh. So that's why you're acting as a ghost-looper?" Rainbow frowned; there weren't enough details for her to work up much sympathy, and she didn't quite get how this could be the reason why this girl - she needed to find out her real name, actually - would give up most, if not all, autonomy in decision making in order to experience Twilight Sparkle's life.

"Well, yeah!" The ghost-looper's looked back up at the pegasus as her frown turned upside down. "Twilight Sparkle was in a position like mine - she wasn't bullied, mind, but she was isolated and didn't have much social experience. Unlike me, though, she was given the assignment of learning about friendship. In her place, I've the loop just spending time with my - her - friends, putting my life in their hands and vice versa. I stu- she studies friendship like a science and becomes better for it. I thought that if I could experience her life, I could become better too."

Rainbow Dash nodded, a smile forming. "Well, I guess that makes sense. Still, if you've been Twilight until now, I suppose I haven't introduced myself to you yet." She raised her hoof. "My name's Rainbow Dash, and I can clear the skies in ten seconds flat! And go around the world, but that's a footnote. You?"

The purple unicorn hesitated for a second before reciprocating, placing her hoof against Rainbow's. "Call me Skitter."

* * *

4.14 (bobbananaville)

Rainbow Dash wasn't used to Awakening with no in-loop memories; usually whenever she entered a loop, she had something with which she could immediately evaluate the world she had entered along with a preset(?) role to fill. At the very least, her pre-awake self had existed and had influenced the world around her prior to her amnesia.

In this case, however, Rainbow Dash found that she'd materialized in front of a high school right when students had begun pouring in. Everybody stopped to stare at the pegasus (for she was in her baseline form, though this didn't consciously register yet); some had brought out phones and were closing in to take pictures; others were backing away in fear. Pressured as she was, the rainbow-maned Pegasus did the first thing she could think of: she bolted.

"A winged equine creature was seen outside Arcadia High this morning. Eyewitness reports say that it had materialized 'out of nowhere' and 'vanished' before any pictures could be taken, but the being was described as having 'blue fur' and 'a rainbow-like mane'. In addition, speeds reaching past mach five - five times the speed of sound - were recorded above Brockton Bay by the local Protectorate division at around same time."

Taylor's eyes widened. "You know it?" Lisa asked before she took a bite out of her burger.

Taylor took a moment to swallow her bacon-wrapped sausage. "Oh, uh, yeah. I replaced her loop's anchor just last loop; her name's Rainbow Dash. Didn't expect her to end up here." Taylor clicked a link on her browser and immediately snorted. "Look, there's a topic here called 'Equine Endbringer'."

"Why's that funny? Is she harmless or something?"

Taylor snorted again and shook her head. "Hell no; she could probably take down Levathian and Behemoth with ease - well, any long-lived looper could, but she's still powerful. It's just funny; thinking that Rainbow Dash, of all people, could be feared as a potential Endbringer."

"It makes sense, though," Lisa commented. "'Rainbow Dash' clearly isn't human. She came quite literally out of nowhere, and has enough power to accelerate to mach five immediately. So far, the only other known powerful non-humans are the Endbringers and Scion - and after the Simurgh, I doubt many people will treat it as a potential ally." She raised an eyebrow when Taylor's response was muffled by another bacon-wrapped sausage. "That's, er, a lot of meat you're eating."

Taylor swallowed what she was chewing (Swallowing without bothering to finish chewing didn't seem healthy, Lisa noted.) "I spent the last five years stuck with a diet of dandelions and hay. Excuse me if I want to pig out."

"What are the chances she'll stay in Brockton Bay for the next five hours?" Taylor asked her fellow looper.

"Ninety eight point six percent," Dinah replied, licking her ice-cream cone. "Eighty seven percent chance you'll find her in the next five hours if you search the docks. Oh, don't look surprised, Taylor, it was easy to predict where you were going with this."

Taylor nodded. "Er, right, thanks. Sorry for making you use your power like this, Dinah."

"No worries," the girl replied. "You going to kill Coil before he tries to kidnap me again?"

Taylor nodded. "I'll try, anyway; you know how hard it is to deal with his power." Dinah winced in sympathy. "I need to meet Rainbow first, though. I don't think she knows much about Earth Bet, and I don't want her doing anything rash here, like ascend."

"Ascend?"

"Yeah; she grows a horn and doubles in size. She becomes extremely powerful then, and she might cause a panic." Taylor chuckled as she remembered the previous loop, wherein Rainbow Dash pranked Celeastia by sabotaging Taylor's ascension (with her permission) and ascending in her place. Seeing the Princess' face as her plans fell to pieces was almost priceless. "She's pretty awesome, actually; I'll make sure she meets you before the loop is done. Alright, I'm off now. Thanks for the help!"

When Rainbow Dash discovered that she couldn't open her subspace pocket, she immediately thought of Eiken. But no; she still had all of her looper abilities, she just couldn't get access to her stuff. Which sucked, because without it she couldn't get a spare laptop or phone to scour the internet with. That meant she had to settle with what she could glean from newspapers and magazines.

Which was still a lot, mind; she'd found out that world was filled with superheroes and supervillains, most superheroes were in an organized, government approved group called the Protectorate, there were various amnesiacs with inhuman traits known as case fifty threes (she considered the idea that she could pose as one), and there were by beings known as 'Endbringers' which seemed to happen quite regularly. Still, what she learned wasn't quite enough for her to make any decisions as to what she could do that loop.

"Rainbow Dash?" Rainbow's ears perked up, and the cyan pegasus turned to look at the source; a girl in a black and gray suit that completely covered her. "I'm Skitter; we met last loop? Well, last loop for me, in any rate. I'm a local looper here in Brockton Bay."

"Hey, yeah! You're the one that ghosted for Twilight!" Rainbow grinned upon remembering the girl. "I didn't expect this place to have any locals, though; I can't open my pocket, so I thought this was a read-only loop."

"Oh, right, the subspace pocket. With all of the tinker tech laying around, subspace pockets had to be turned off to prevent corruption in other loops."

Rainbow nodded, saving her question (What is tinker tech?) for later. "I don't suppose you could give me a rundown of the baseline?"

"Long version or very long version?"

"There's no short version?" Taylor shook her head.

* * *

4.15 (The_One_Butcher)

Twilight awoke buried in filth. Oh... Nope, nope, noperooni, not dealing with that. A flash and she was two hundred meter up, immaculate and an Alicorn, waiting for her Loop Memories. Oh, a Bullying Campaign. A really bad friendship problem. That's exactly her field of expertise! And a Loop in the Hub. No, wait, there's Superheroes and... Giant Monsters? Mass Murderers? Nope, that's going to stop ASAP. She retrieved the other Elements of Harmony from her subspace Pocket and started casting Divinations.

One Rainbow Mind Hug and a few tearful days later a plan was formed. Or rather enough courage gathered to start looking for a solution.

The phone on Julia Roberts' desk rang. She took it and answered with the kindest voice she could muster, which, in the case of retired Superhero Empathy, was indeed kind. "Protectorate Main, Councelling, Roberts speaking. How can I help you."

"Hello. I Have an unbelievable problem. I have really suddenly and unexpectedly become a parahuman." The voice on the other end was tired and empty.

"That is a problem our Department specializes in. Don't worry, we will help you to the best of our abilities to overcome this trying time. Ask anything, I will try to help and if you want you can come to any PRT Building on short notice to recieve help. If you don't want to reveal your identity, don't worry, we are plenty discreed."

"Well I guess I should start from the beginning, but it's really quite unbelievable. You probably will think it's a prank call, I wouldn't believe myself. When I realized what was going on I spend the last few days crying." He sounded like it too. Triggers were always traumatic, but that voice was like his whole life came crashing down and there was nothing pleasant left to live for.

"Don't worry. I'm a professional. I would say I've heard stranger, but I was surprised often in the past. Even so, I want to help you and thus I will believe anything you tell me. If that means that I'm gonna be pranked a few times, that doesn't matter. Even If nearly all calls here were prank calls, helping one man avoid the fate of Villainy would be worth it."

"Well, well, Okay. When I woke up on Wednesday I was surrounded by most of the Slaughterhouse Nine."

"Oh, I'm so sorry."

"Nono, that wasn't the worst part, although it was a pretty frightening moment. I took a second to recognize them, and then they started screaming and running away." What? Well maybe he got some kind of fear power? Oh... A power that made anyone afraid of you. Maybe even uncontrollable? It was likely given the man was so broken up about it. But better not jump to conclusions so early. "I tried to run too, because, let's face it, what else do you do in that situation, but I ran into Crawler who hadn't moved and just screamed. Bonesaw was backed to a wall and shaking like a leaf, shrinking into herself. For one moment I felt sorry for her, until I remembered who she was. Anyway, I scrambled away from Crawler, who twisted and turned and patted himself. He screamed "What happened to me? Oh God, what happened to me." I looked around and saw that Bonesaw was staring wide eyed at Mannequin who in turn examined himself, just as Crawler was. I wanted to know what was going on and that was when it hit me..." The man trailed off.

So... his power makes people panic and be afraid of each other? No... That wouldn't explain Crawler and Mannequin. When the man didn't answer she asked in a small voice: "Sir, what was it?" Soft, small, afraid. Just like the man must have felt.

"I remembered that I was Jack Slash..." What? Oh... That... That was really unbelievable. It was a good story, but no, she didn't believe it at all. Good thing she was so good at acting. Famous for it even in Aleph! Damn sods didn't pay her a cent... Stupid trigger event, ruining her acting career...

Her voice was free of any disbelief when she spoke again: "So, you lost your Memory?"

"No. Well, yes. We don't know who I was before, but... We can't be... them What they did... I... I can't even think of one of these things without..." The man on the other side broke down crying again. Whoohee, that sounds realistic. It's not like her power couldn't be fooled, but damn, that guy was at least some kind of parahuman. "Sir... If we can confirm your story, confirm it in any way, we'll help you."

Dragon watched the shaking little Girl as Alexandria, Eidolon and Gallant homed in on her, slowly circling closer. A mile away on a hilltop were the rest of the Slaughterhouse Nine, minus the Siberian. It smelled like a trap. It was one at least in one direction. Legend was near, hiding in a cloud, the Hill was trapped with a fuel air explosive, enough to kill Jack, Shatterbird, Hatchet Face and maybe even Mannequin and Miasma. If they were even real. Burnscar could probably survive any kind of fireball and Crawler would probably not even get a scratch. A Stealth Bomber with three massive containment foam Missles as well as her new self regenerating Suit were to follow up the Detonation.

Surprisingly everything checked out. All Thinkers and Strangers consulted confirmed that they didn't want to kill anyone ever again. The New Nine didn't know where the Siberian was, that was a shame, because that probably meant the Siberian was immune to whatever happened to them. Bonesaw wanted to use her power to save as many lives as possible in order to maybe one day bring the total to positive. Mannequin wanted to start designing Ecological repair units and Terraformers again, as well as better anti-Endbringer shelters. Shatterbird, Hatchet Face, Burnscar, Crawler and Jack became Superheroes in the Protectorate. The PR was a nightmare, but in the End it was accepted that someone wiped their minds and put new people into the Slaughterhouse Nine. The unknown Hero wasn't found, probably because a power as scary as that meant he wanted to lay low and not use it on anyone short of the Nine.

A fansite for the Soul Reaper with suggestions sprang up and shortly after Heartbreaker, Butcher, Valefor and Eligas had an epiphany and turned themselves in.

The Damsel of Distress too, with many theatrics, wanted to once again convince people she was actually a scary Supervillain by claiming Soul Reaper had claimed her. But the Empaths said there was no change in her personality so she was simply carted of to Prison for a few weeks and put on a normal Probation.


	5. Chapter 5

5.1 (nocarename)

I woke up and, as things weren't an immediate disaster, I let the Loop's memories settle in to place.

...Well.

I hadn't been bullied. At all. I was, in fact, friends with Emma Barnes and Sophia Hess and one of the queens of Winslow.

That was, well it was something was what it was.

-0-

It wasn't hard to find Sophia at school. All you had to do was to head for the fields and look the same direction as most of the boys. I had to get closer though.

"Sophia, got a minute?" I asked.

"Sure, what's up Taylor?" she replied without breaking from her stretching.

"I Woke Up this morning," I said with some emphasis.

"Sure. Great. That's why you made it to school?" she asked. She sounded a little confused.

"No, like Woke Up, woke up."

"Oh. So you?" She trailed off, not sure how to ask without giving anything away.

I let a swarm of the male mosquitoes in the field twist into a tight spiral for a few seconds before scattering in a starburst.

"Right. Hell. How long before I get the bees?" she asked.

"No bees," I said, "Not unless you were just stringing me along."

"Nah," she said, "I just figured we had, you know, some kind of loop without you-you, that's all. Figured I'd get to know you a little more."

"Right."

"So, I guess this means that the sleep over is off this weekend?"

I dug a little more into the local memories for the Loop. Right. Besties. "Oh yeah," I said, "And you get to explain it to Emma without mentioning anything like possession or triggering."

"Awesome," said Sophia dryly, "Catch you around?"

"I guess," I said, "Might be nice actually going to school for a little bit without nearly as much crazy."

"Good luck with that," said Sophia, "Something always happens."

I nodded at that and headed off. Some of the guys watching tracked me instead of sticking to Sophia.

Being popular was weird. Hopefully Sam was Awake and things would make sense if I talked to her.

* * *

5.2 (The_One_Butcher)

"You're a Pony!"

"Yup! Rainbow Dash's the name, fastest Pegasus in Equestria! Well... Fastest Flyer. Period! I can go Warp seven unassisted, easy."

"You're a Talking Magical Pegasus Pony!"

Yes... I already mentioned that." Rainbow Dash said with a deadpan expression.

"OH MY GOD! IT'S SO CUTE!" Rainbow Dash was outraged. "I AM NOT! I am Rainbow Dash, I am awesome, not cute!" She pouted.

"Daww! She thinks she's rough and tumble! She thinks she's tough! THAT IS SO ADORABLE!"

Asskicking ensued.

* * *

1.11 cont (Rex)

Tattletale twigged to Coil acting weird.

Damn.

Obvious in retrospect, I would have noticed it from previous experience even without forewarning, of course Tattletale would notice. At this point she is desperately trying to gather more information on Coil for her mutiny, since she isn't focused on making me stop being suicidal Coil gets even more of her focus. Didn't think she'd jump to a master this fast and then share it with the rest of the group. Irrelevant, I need to cover this up.

First step, mental defenses as high as they go, emotional responses pushed onto swarm, and get into character. Second step-

"It was me. Sorry."

Have whatever plan I was going to come up with get wrecked by Sam. I suppose I should be used to that by this point. I mean, it has been pretty much the entirety of our interactions which didn't involve me trying to kill her for the past couple millennia.

"You're a master?" Grue asked. He voice was tense, and I could tell he was getting ready for a fight. "Why didn't you tell us?" A betrayal to the team, and a threat to the man that would give him his sister, I could see why he'd be pissed.

I stayed silent, but three blocks away a swarm of bugs made noises that sounded suspiciously close to "Are you about to tell them who you are? Cause I don't see them being okay with that right now."

"I knew that all of you would be suspicious about it if I told you from the start. I was not planning to tell you for another three weeks and six days, at which point I would with 96% reliability gained strong enough relationships to avoid serious negative reactions. But Tattletale noticed what I did to Coil." Sam crossed her arms in front of her and started speaking again before anyone could respond to her reveal. "I can share my visions of the future with other person. But whenever I do that there's… contamination."

Inside a currently closed daycare center a Speak & Spell toy activated. "Not quite." It enunciated the empty room. Well, empty aside from the small ant colony that was feasting on the juice stain from little Jonny Chocrane's lunch earlier today. Conveniently, the Speak & Spell had been left out right next to the spill.

"Contamination? What's that supposed to mean?" Regent asked with a carefully nonchalant tone.

"They start to view things the same way I do. Put more value on the things I like, be less inclined to do things I wouldn't approve of." The mind manipulator answered the body manipulator. I think she was trying to look contrite, or embarrassed, but all I could picture was Brutus covered in one of Parian's wool blankets. Heh, post apocalyptic Undersider's daycare had been fun. I should do that again some other time.

"That's still not everything." Tattletale's green eyes were narrowed. That was her 'you are a fascinating mystery that I would love to take the time to gently and thoroughly work my way through with a cup of hot chocolate and someone giving me a foot massage, but you might present a threat to me and my family so I'm going to tear you into confetti. You inconsiderate barbarian.' The intuitionpath continued her deduction. "You can control how strong it is, shape the path of the influences."

Sam nodded. Back at the Speak & Spell & Spill more words were typed out. "3 state. Then interrupt. P. L. S." I considered it. Then I checked my Sciontracker™ and had the ants refuse her request. "If this is a mistake, then you shouldn't manipulate you're way out of an argument with your friends. If this was a plan, then it counts as manipulating me beforehand and the two of us have bigger problems.

Sam shifted her footing in the parking lot while she nodded in response to Tattletale's accusation. I felt a little bit bad about refusing to help her, but there was no way I was going to start automatically jumping to her defense when she pulled something like this. She typed out "Mistake. U. Right." With her voice, she said "I can. Coil didn't care about any of you. He was going to drug Lisa and I to keep as slaves if anything went wrong with the Undersiders. As it is he's planning to string along Grue's case and delay helping Noelle for as long as he can manage." She hugged herself tighter and turned her head to the side. "I can't change anybodies basic nature, all I can do is provide a push in the direction I want."

"And you pushed Coil into valuing the Undersiders as a group. Because we're the most important people in the world to you. You haven't been using your Master powers to mess with us." Tattletale's three statements. I could see how this would be an excellent place to interrupt. "But you've wanted to." Yes, three statements would have been an excellent time to interrupt. Oh well. "Is that what made Skitter so mad at you? No, something else, you di-"

"She said something I didn't like. Things escalated. We've resolved the issue. If we aren't going to be attacking each other on the spot can we head home. It's getting cold out. We can discuss Sam and I not telling you guys the full details of her powers once we get there. I will state for the record she has agreed not to do it to anyone without my express permission. Considering what I've seen happen at Coil's base, everything I could dig up about his history, and what Sam's told me about his real plans, and I emphasize: told, not shown, I don't feel even a little guilty making him less likely to betray us."

I turned to go, confident that Sam would fall into step behind me. This would lead Tattletale to keep pace with her so she could continue questioning Sam. With half the group moving, Regent would follow along out of sheer apathy. Grue would start moving next because having the leader let everyone just walk away from them sends a bad message. Rachel on the other hand would just head back to one of her shelters rather than associate with somebody that had lied to her. I would have to do so much extra work to get back into her good graces.

Still, immediate crisis dealt with. Now for riding the aftershocks. And a Leviathan on the horizon, only nine days out.

But before I settled down for the night there was one more concern I had to attend to.

"We'll get through this. They will forgive you in time." Ants don't do comforting very well.

"I know. Thanks." Speak & Spell's don't do emotion at all.

"We should get you a laptop if we're going to keep using this trick."

"Thanks. Saturday." I chose to assume that Saturday was meant as a questioning invitation. My body nodded and found Sam's hand for a quick squeeze. She was being such a good little girl/endbringer. I might even actually have the slightest bit of trust in our friendship at some point if she kept this up.

* * *

5.3 (Focus13)

The figure in white stands over Lung like some pale morose gargoyle. Female, My power identifies. I do another scan of the broken and battered street and can't help but let out an impressed whistle. The road was littered with bodies and massive holes, with the occasional patch of flickering flame, not quite yet dying down. Any ABB member here is definitely going to need medical attention, I note, wincing at those unmoving, bearing second and third degree burns.

My power is running passively, taking info, calculating, categorizing and finally inferring. High powered explosives from the holes, napalm from the still burning flames. Obvious enough, I think, having felt force from the detonations a few blocks over. Ambushed from the positioning of the bodies. Never given a chance to escape eyes flicking back to the woman. No that's not right, girl. Its easier to see her now that she's moved away from Lung, slowly closing distance toward us. Details are made more clear with each step. The white coat crested with lavender is made of fine expensive material even, I don't need my power for that, just countless hours of mall shopping put to use. The upper half of her face is hidden by her hood, but I can tell her facial features to be sharp from the shape and contour of her jaw. But my eyes keep going to her left arm, guess-work power subconsciously drawn to the too-small-to-be practical buckler gracing her forearm. It's silver and gold colored, caressed with converging artistic swirls. 'Some kind of tinker invention?' I mentally wonder, but focus back on her features after a slight stab of pain behind my eyes. Evidently my Thinker ability didn't want to analyze the object. Odd but not altogether uncommon. That's actually the reason for the majority of my Thinker-headaches. Extraneous effort sussing out facts in abnormalities.

Grue moves to intercept, ever the diplomatic one. It's pointless though, she side steps him without a word, eyes locked on mine.

She gently tugs her hood back and looong dark hair spills out everywhere as she stops less than a meter away from me. 'What cape was so casual about revealing their civilian identity?' I think but smile and offer my hand in greeting anyways, trying to convey an aura of casualness. Maybe she was gonna go the New Wave route of hero-ing and this was her debut. Either way she's gone and done the Undersiders a huge favor. She seems to be trusting of us, so might as well meet her halfway. She ignores my outstretched hand, in favor of maintaining an uncomfortable amount of eye contact with me, borderline gaunt features twisting into a look of... Pain?

It's hard to keep the smile and lax body language with what she says next. "Lisa." There's an almost palpable amount of shame in her tone that startles me more than the use of my civilian name. As a result the tight control over my power slips and information collated about her and the encounter floods my thoughts.

Grieved

Explosive Expert

Ashamed

Weapons Expert

Knowledgeable of Me Intimately

Exhausted

High Ranked Mover-Tinker?

Affection Towards Me

...What.

She steps forward to clasp my still outstretched hand while I'm mentally reeling from the info dump and all traces of anguish are gone. Her countenance has gone iron hard and there's a newly lit fire in her eyes. She's close enough now that I can see her dark eyes dilate. Her next statement is so full of fervor it makes my budding panic explode, sending my power into overdrive. "I swear I'll save you. No matter how many times I have to repeat all of this, I'll protect you!"

Devoted

Borderline Obsessed

Spatial Manipulation

Self Sacrificing

Done This before

Knowledgeable

Time Manipulation

Time Traveller

The last bit of info is like a punch to the gut and I flinch, knowing this deluge of info is going to result in one hell of a backlash. Spots dance over my vision and the world seems to press around me. I jerk away from the girl and suck in a breathe through my clenched teeth. Time Travel. That couldn't be right. That seemed impossible, even in a world full of capes. I grip my head, trying impotently to ward off the tsunami of agony I know is incoming. Had my power erred? It happened on occasion, the wrong building block resulting on an incorrect conclusion. I want to reassess the girl, check and see that she wasn't just some ridiculously over-powered Thinker that knew how to put me out with all of two sentences and feigned body language. 'Competitive much?' my subconscious mocks randomly before disappearing.

But she's gone. Without a trace. Not even an afterimage left in her wake. 'Well' I think 'that lends credence to my Mover hypothesis at least.' The others finally godamn move as I nearly sink to the ground. Alec is saying something but I can barely hear him over the sound of my blood pumping in it's veins. 'Time Travel' I think again, absently noting Grue had caught me from falling. 'That's impossible... right?'

* * *

5.4 (The_One_Butcher)

Thanks Bulma. Taylor thought as she deposited the three smoking corpses of the Endbringers into the Trash corner at school. The Terrible Trio was crouched in the corner, gibbering in fear. Strangely nobody was doubting they were real. I guess rumor does travel faster than light.

"Miss Hebert?" Asked Mr. Quinlan in an unparalleled display of balls. "Why are you disposing of these corpses at School?"

"Well, Mr. Quinlan, my own house has only one ordinary trashcan and bulk trash isn't covered in our plan. But the school has a full free disposal contract. As I am a student in this school I am allowed to deposit any trash I like here. Including animal carcasses, I've checked!"

* * *

5.5 (The_One_Butcher)

Lisa awoke with a start, not in her bed in the loft, but in a golden throne overlooking New York. What woke her up was the door banging open and the unconscious forms of a dozen of the strongest Protectorate Heroes and the corpses of most of the Slaughterhouse Nine being tossed through it by what looked like Scion, but was actually an illusion. It seems as if someone used a power to make sure I stay asleep.

"I have done as you said Mistress." they killed Scion and replaced him, "None now stand in your way. I will now go and fetch your Lust Slaves." They conquered the World in her name while she slept. The Illusion flew away through the window, deliberately leaving her alone.

As if that was their cue, it was, Eidolon and the Siberian burst through the door, both with a Look of utter hatred on their faces.

"This is not what it looks like!"

* * *

5.6 (The_One_Butcher)

"I cast Petrificus Totalus!" Taylor spoke as the last member of the Empire 88 squad's arms and legs snapped to his sides and he toppled.

"Good work, Witchcraft! Man, it's really nice to have a high level nonlethal Blaster on the team. The way you mopped those guys up is urk!" with that Aegis went down.

"I've seen you in action now, Witch. I know how to beat you now." a smooth voice came from Aegis prone(but alive) form.

"Cricket and Kaiser! Damn, they got reinforcements!" Clockblocker readied his paper to block ranged attacks and give Taylor cover to shoot from.

"I am a witch. My magic can do a lot more than what you have seen." That got you some smirks and bemused side glances from Clockie.

"Sure." Kaiser began. "But that still means you have to be able to hit us." And with that they began an erratic approach.

Taylor readied her wand: "I cast Confringo!" The Blast shattered one of Kaiser's barriers, but a second had sprung up already. Clockblocker meanwhile had created a barrier and threw deadly lines of frozen silk into Cricket's path.

Kaiser shot a lot of spears at them to which Taylor reacted with a hurried: "I cast Protego!" The shield held under the smaller spears, but was soon battered away with a heavy steel ram.

Doesn't matter, it bought enough time for her finishing move: "I cast BEEEES!"

With that she emptied her subspace pocket.

Which had been filled to the brim.

Fourty Behemoths worth of Bees filled Brockton Bay's street that day.

"Finite Incantatem." Which buzzed to life all at once.

* * *

5.7 (The_One_Butcher)

Harry didn't know what was wrong, but somehow nothing was. The Wizarding World made a lot more sense. Dumbledore knew exactly what to do against Voldemort and Snape was perfectly civil and ignored Harry largely. Malfoy was smarmy and manipulative but went about it intelligently. The great Hero was his Mom, not Harry himself and public opinion behaved sensible. The Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher was Remus Lupin and for some reason he managed to stay until the beginning of the Third year when Harry saw the first piece of evidence as to what could have caused all these positive changes. His timetable read Samantha Trelawney instead of Sibyll.

He immediately deduced that Dumbledore had access to a competent Seer. He send out a Ping once again, but didn't get a return. Maybe it was a relatively new Looper?

Divination came around and Harry ascended the steps a few minutes before everyone else. "Ah, I guess my friend forgot to tell me how you do that. Thank you for teaching me, Harry." He felt a Ping. "I find it really refreshing how I can use my abilities freely in this universe without people getting mad and thinking I want to manipulate them! Yes that was me. Yes, that too of course. No other Loopers in this iteration until the reset. SAM. It's for Seer and Mastermind, but my real name is "The Simurgh." or sometimes a derogatory Ziz. Yes I am. Skitter's Universe. Completely. My Creator needed worthy opponents. No, just ignorance. Eidolon. The Power to have three Superpowers he needs at the time. I know, it's really really relaxing! No really. Where I come from everyone but Skitter and the Big Bad is infinitely weaker than me. And in baseline I use my power and telekinesis to give people brain surgery in order to turn them into human time bombs. No one trusts me. They all think that whenever they interact with me it can only end horribly, no matter what they do because I knew they knew I knew at infinitum. The Wizards here are all so welcoming and trusting. Exactly! Sheep are nice things! They are fluffy! That is something good! The other students have assembled."

The trapdoor opened and the other students came into the room. "Yes Miss Granger, I know this room looks like a "new age" kinda shop, but in divination your state of mind is really important. You need to trick your magic into letting it give you a peak into things the universe hasn't calculated yet. You have to outrace the laws of nature. You cannot do that and be fully conscious unless you have a connection to some vastly powerful calculation matrix. That is what we call the Inner Eye. While you find it annoying I would rather not waste too much class time on this I can give you the scientific explanation tomorrow afternoon if you'd like. When other students are interested in your question I will let you speak." She turned to the room at large "So, you have heard the rumor that I often foretell a students death and none of them are dead yet. That is not a testament to my lack of skill in divination but rather the point of foretelling their death. Forewarned is forearmed. If you really want a demonstration of the accuracy of my warnings you can persuade Lavender Brown not to buy a sturdier cage for her pet rabbit. Now we will in this class learn many basic techniques for non-Seers to get glimpses and singular points of data gleaned from the universe itself. The most important part is to get those relevant to you and afterwards to decipher the universe's humor. Many of you have heard of the Grim, the Ghostly Black Dog, the most potent Omen of Death. Fortunately all those Death Omens flitting around right now refer to a lovable black stray who after adoption will be called Snuffles. Sometimes the Situation in which the Prophecy is made is not the one it applies to. Other times there is ambiguity and our choices make the outcome. Dedicated intelligent effort can derail almost any prophecy. Exception to that Rule is this one. If you don't do your homework and don't take this subject seriously you will not get a passing mark. Except for Mister Weasley, he's a natural. Miss Granger and Mister Potter don't need the homework, but need to take it seriously. I like teaching and will toss them out if they try to ruin it for me, so stop it with the Paradoxes!" Here she looked directly at Harry, frowning. The Anchor giggled but raised his hands in a placating guesture.

"Very well. First technique: Tea leaves. Everyone take a cup and follow my instructions. Mr Longbottom and I will demonstrate, then I will go around and tell you if you got a real magical pattern or just something random and you can try again. Then we will identify the Omens and think of possible interpretations and what to do about them." Sam was extremely enthusiastic about that. So many new friends! And they all accepted her for who she was!

* * *

1.11 cont (Rex)

It was a relaxed and lazy Friday for the Undersiders. Or at least that was one interpretation of events, the other was that they were all recuperating from the explosive argument that had occurred the previous night. The only reason that Skitter and Sam were still on the team is that Tattletale confirmed they didn't have any malicious plans, hadn't used Sam's brainwashing powers on anybody on the team, and the only thing Sam had done was make Coil less likely to betray them for his own benefit.

Regent had pointed out that that was actually quite decent of her. Sam had declared her intention to help Imp kill his father. This had confused several people, but Regent considered it rather nice of her even if he had no idea who Imp was. The fight had dragged on long into the night until everybody eventually got tired enough to let go of any anger they still felt the need to express.

Bitch was out taking care of her dogs, Lisa had dragged Taylor out on some sort of shopping trip, and Brian was in the kitchen reviewing his bank statements and making sure he had everything ready for the next social worker visit to his apartment. Thus it came to be that a pajama clad Alec and Sam could have a private conversation while simultaneously driving up the blood pressure of every other person that didn't have anything better to do than online multiplayer at 2:30 in the afternoon.

"So you can make people feel any emotion you want while you're touching 'em?" Alec asked with forced casualness. Sam shook her head slightly and tossed a grenade around a blind corner.

"I push them into the same set of emotions that I have in relation to whatever it is I am showing them. The only reason Coil is so noticeable is that he has been double dosing pretty much every moment he can and so many of his questions are about our team."

"You feel pretty strongly about us don't you." More forced casualness, Sam wondered why he bothered. Even without pre-cog the question he really wanted to ask was fairly obvious.

"Yes. I do not really understand all of the things normal people do and think, but I am making good progress and all of you are an important part of that." A quick no scope sniper shot killed an opponent that would have distracted Regent at a critical moment.

"So could you- ah." Regent interrupted himself to dodge back into cover before Rebu1006 could finish locking on with a rocket launcher. A quick roll and some suppressive fire from Steel_Naga put his character in position to slay the top-ranked local player. The match ended in victory fanfare as Regent turned his attention back to Sam. He opened his mouth but his blonde companion cut him off.

"No Jean-Paul, I will not use my powers to forcibly push emotional capacity onto you. Partially because using master powers on teammates is wrong. Partially because Skitter would absolutely kill me if I did." A small smirk flitted across her face before she resumed her serious expression. "But mainly because I am sure you are going to make it on your own, and it will be much more rewarding when you do."

Regent averted his eyes, having Sam sound so open and proud of him was… uncomfortable somehow. "Is that 'I can see the future' sure or 'sappy after school special' sure?"

Sam put her hand on his leg and leaned forward so he could meet her cloth covered eyes. "Can it not be both?" She placed an attempt at a winning smile on her face.

"Heh." Alec snorted. "even I can tell when you're trying too hard ta fake it." He shook his head. "But still, thanks for the parts you did mean."

Sam relaxed back onto the couch. "Then you are welcome for all of it." Regent looked at the hand that remained on his leg. With a mental shrug, he let go of one side of the controller.

"Soo," He placed his hand on hers. She withdrew her hand and looked at him with the most honest sign of surprise he could ever recall seeing on her. She shook her head.

"Sorry, that is part of the human thing I still don't get at all." She turned her attention back to the tv screen, forcibly cutting off her body puppet's inexplicable reaction to redirect blood flows towards its facial structures. "besides, wouldn't want to interfere."

Regent raised an eyebrow but let that comment pass without further questioning. It'd probably all make sense later. The two returned to their game. Rebu1006, IFF7, and Steel_Naga had joined forces with dlobok-llong and were challenging the two of them, Allcount%, and Clockover to a 4 vs. 4 match.

Half an hour later Brian packed his stuff of and made his way out of the loft. He pointedly ignored the victory celebrations of Alec and the person he was playing with. His interruption was ignored when Alec froze in place for a moment before his head whipped around to point at the East wall. Sam had matched his movements and stared intently towards the direction of the boardwalk.

"I feel a great disturbance in the trollforce, my apprentice, as if a great opportunity has been lost." Regent intoned in a semi-mystical tone.

"And yet, my master," Sam replied in a matching tone. "I sense that this loss has opened the door on many other options." The two turned their heads to each other.

"We must learn what has occurred, that we may construct a greater and more perfect trolltunity." Brian was becoming concerned at this point. Partially at whatever those two were planning, and partially because, well, find out one of your teammates can brainwash people to be more like her one day, observe disquieting unity in different teammate the next…

"Or we could just keep playing video games because fuck hard work." Regent broke character.

"I'm okay with this!" Sam declared as she thrust a finger in the air. "Would you like to join us Brian? I predict Predishade is going to log on within the next two minutes."

Brian shrugged. "eh, why not? I'm always ready to team up with the toughest gamer girl in Brockton." He grinned at Sam's fake insulted look.

And so Zorkdarkness joined Jack_King and Eidokid3 in the eternal struggle between Red and Blu.

* * *

5.8 (The_One_Butcher)

Dlobok I didn't get at all, Eidokid3 made me Lol.

"What does Eidokid3 stand for?"

"I'm Eidolon's third child."

"Eidolon has kids? No wonder your parents don't have time for you. Who's your Mom?"

"No one. He once had a Superpower that let him have incredibly powerful Para-children. On his own."

"That's fucked up. Who are your siblings?"

"Well, one of them will be in town soon. I can introduce you."

"Sure, I'm looking forward to it."

"You're the only one."

What is Sam going to say about Levi? I reccomend: "Scion is going to be in town in a week. Gives me one hell of a blackout..."

"Fuck it," Regent said, his voice almost inaudible. He was looking at Imp.

When he rose to his feet.

"Hey Shitcrumb!" Regent hollered, backing away from cover, raising both his middlefingers. "Easy-"

Behemoth dropped the flame attack. I could see Yàngbǎn members raising forcefields as he reached out, casting a bolt of lightning in Regent's direction. The forcefields did nothing, not even softening the blow in any measurable way.

Regent Screamed. He didn't just scream, he "The Scream"ed.

The lightning cut off.

Regent was still there.

Behemoth dropped to one knee.

He reached out with one hand and Regent strolled to him at a leisurely pace. He stepped onto the hand, Behemoth deposited him atop his neck and used his dynakinesis to anchor him there and amplify his voice as he shouted: "I AM THE KING OF THE WORLD!"

In the end it was decided that a human controlled Endbringer was better than a free one and Regent agreed to take a No-Sleep modification from a hastily retrieved Panacea and was given Brockton Bay and Skitter's freedom as a bounty.

* * *

5.9 (procrastinator)

The Simurgh was the first one they noticed.

It was hard not to, when she suddenly preformed a mid-air loop, turned around and started in the direction of Brockton Bay.

It was the longest warning they had yet of an Endbringer attack and they wanted to take full advantage of it.

Then Dragon reported in. Leviathan was heading in the same direction.

A few hours later, no one was surprised when Behemoth was reported under South America tunneling north.

Debates raged. Some wanted to fight, consensus was that they were attacking Brockton Bay because of a new powerful Parahuman that could take them down recently triggered there, and if they could find out who they could win the war if not the battle.

Eventually they agreed, Brockton Bay would be abandoned. The PRT would help speed up evacuations and pull any capes who wanted to leave out.

A small group got together, mostly Brockton Bay natives, and they agreed that they would not leave. They could see the writing on the wall. This was the last Endbringer fight, the only one that mattered, after this it was likely that the three monsters would keep attacking in a group, better to fight and die now than a long drawn out chase.

Word was quietly sent out, and dozens more came.

They assembled near the beach, close to the place Dragon predicted Behemoth would come up. Tinkers who could gave out whatever they had, even old model weapons that were sitting in storage. The Wards were clustered with the Undersiders, one unlucky fool had tried to convince them to leave, to leave the fighting to the adults. He was ok after Panacea got to him.

Then the rumbling started. A huge shelf of rock arose on the field everyone was watching, and then she swooped in.

Almost immediately every piece of metal in their hands and on their bodies jumped off and flew towards her.

They were so shocked by this they almost didn't notice him landing on the rock with the help of a large wave.

Then the metal started coalescing into shapes the Simurgh grabbed one that started to shape itself into a vaguely gun like object. Another form took shape in front of Leviathan too indistinct to make out.

Then he rose from the ground, like a demon from the pits of Hell. In front of him several huge round objects formed, mostly out of earth. He opened his mouth and everyone tensed as a beam of light came out. But it was only aimed at the small figure on the ground in front of the huge beasts.

"HELLO, BROCKTON BAY!"

Behemoth raised his sticks high, tapped them four times, before bringing them down on his drums. Blazoned on the front was "SKITTER AND THE ENDBRINGERS".

* * *

5.10 (Helian05)

Thirty-two times. Thirty-two times I've relived my life. Either I die and the world restarts, or I beat Scion, and the world restarts a few days later. I don't know why, I don't understand what I did wrong, why I'm being punished like this. And make no mistake, that's what this is. It's some form of fucked up punishment. Maybe killing Scion the first time fucked up reality? Maybe he cursed me? Maybe this is just hell.

I've tried doing different things. Not going Khepri for one. I've only managed to beat him once without going Khepri. Now that I know the trick to it though, those times I do go stupid and insane I can beat him fast. Save a few billion lives. Haven't figured out a way to heal myself yet though. Not before Contessa gives me 9mm surgery.

And there have been a few differences, here and there. Not many. Usually not big ones. One time Behemoth and Leviathan didn't exist yet, instead Bohu and Tohu were the first Endbringers. They showed up after we killed the twins in India though. Another time Dad died in the car accident instead of Mom. That one was hard. Thank God for the memories I get at the beginning. I think I spent a week crying when I first woke up in that one, both out of grief and joy.

But this time. This time may have been the worst. I woke up on April 8th again, which was pretty normal. I was in the bathroom again. Again, normal. But this time I was standing outside the stall. With Madison and Sophia. Holding an empty bottle of grape soda.

And then the memories hit.

As I rushed to the sink to throw up, all I could think was "Well, at least now I know why."

* * *

5.11 (procrastinator)

Fortuna blearily awoke. Yawning loudly, she hit the snooze button on the alarm and shuffled off to the bathroom. It was important to have some routine in her life before her day of running all over the globe doing incomprehensible things started.

After a good shower and brush, she dressed in her costume and went to pour herself a glass of milk.

She than started to run through her usual list of paths, before preforming a fantastic spit-take.

'3 STEPS?' 'WHAT THE HELL?'

She tried again. 'How do I ensure the survival of humanity from any alien threats?'

-Step 1- "Door to Taylor Hebert's house"

-Step 2- "Make Taylor Hebert the Head of Cauldron"

-Step 3- "Obey Taylor Hebert in all things"

* * *

5.12 (Crank Sproket)

Entering their base, the Undersiders were met with an unusual sight. There sitting at the table was Skitter polishing and cleaning something that looked like the barrel of an old anti air gun, but mounted with stock and trigger. The thing looked so heavy it was a miracle the table held. Even more disturbing was the song she was quietly singing to herself during her task.

"Er, Taylor" said Brian "you OK?"

"Sure, why not?" she replied, never looking away from what she was doing. Clicking the last few elements together, Taylor stood up and picked up the gun. When raised straight up, the Undersiders saw that it was much bigger than they thought. It was about 2m whole and looked totally brutal.

"The hell is this Skitter?" Piped in Alec "And where did you get it?"

"She bought it from a gunsmith she knows, but even I don't know WHAT is it" said Lisa.

Skitter cleared her throat and said "It's a Hellsing ARMS Anti-Midian Cannon 'Harkonnen'. It weights 60 kg unloaded, the 30 mm, single-shot breech loader cannon uses various types of shells, including depleted uranium for piercing armored targets and incendiary napalm rounds for destroying large groups of opponents both on land and in the air." she smiled "And I must be going. I have an appointment to keep." As she walked out of the base the Undersiders heard her singing again "... bad man cruising around in a big black limousine..."

* * *

5.13 (Crank Sproket)

Brian found Lisa getting drunk in the bar. She was well on her way to unconsciousness judging from the number of empty bottles around her.

"OK... what did Taylor do this time?" asked Brian.

Lisa didn't answer and just slid the book that was also on the counter towards him. Title read "Blowing Up Planets for Fun and Profit" by Skitter and Bakuda.

"Well that's rather Bad, but she's had similar schemes in the past, so why getting drunk now?"

"They are working on the second part, this time about solar systems." She said. Brain looked at her blankly

"Horrible, but still doesn't explain why you want to get drunk."

" They're talking about a trilogy" she replied.

"...let me join you"

* * *

5.14 (The_One_Butcher and RitterDesTodes)

"And that is why I like my Purple Alicorn Princess!" Madison finished in spite of Taylor's incessant giggling.

"Taylor!" Mrs. Cardiff scolded, "It was really brave of Madison to be the first today. If you cannot contain yourself maybe you want to be the next to do your Show and Tell? Did you even bring anything?"

"I did Mrs. Cardiff! I rode it to school today, but couldn't bring it into the classroom." Taylor said brightly.

Mrs. Cardiff sighted. "Very well, we will do yours shortly before recess and go outside early."

As the Lesson drew to a close the teacher led the children to recess with five minutes to spare.

"So Taylor, where is your bicycle?" Asked the teacher.

"Bicycle? No, I wanted to show you my Pet! I rode her to school today! Her name is Sam and I really love her, even if she isn't fluffy! SAM! COME HERE."

Which was when the Simurgh glided around the School, where she waited using her precog to avoid detection. The less sheltered half of the class screamed. The smartest quarter of the class started running and the teacher paled and was rooted to the ground in terror. The Simurgh meanwhile lifted Taylor into her arms and hugged her, smiling.

Knowing that escape was futile Mrs. Cardiff instead steeled herself and smiled at Taylor. She vowed to herself to make Taylor her favorite pupil and in turn try to become Taylor's favorite teacher. To become a real friend to Taylor. To make herself really like Taylor.

And the Simurgh would hopefully see that and therefore not do it herself. "So Taylor," she said kindly, "what can you tell us about your friend?"

Taylor meanwhile thought to herself how incredibly badass her kindergarten teacher was.

* * *

5.15 (Rex)

I ignored Glady's request to stay behind a few extra minutes. I had more important things to do, like watch paint dry. More immediately I was focused on a possible song I could use in "Skitter: the musical."

It would be something of a challenge to get everything set up in Earth Aleph quickly enough that I could launch a Broadway musical about my adventures, especially with the addendum that I couldn't let anybody know the show was about me. I only had about three or four years after Scion was slain before I was back in the goddamned locker again, but I needed something to in the down time or I'd go even more crazy.

I stared down at the first stanza I had written down. I was thinking of using it for my first night out with Lung. Sure, it was a blatant rip-off of an Earth Dalet movie, but that wouldn't transfer over to Earth Aleph until 2017 even if the barriers weren't put up. So I felt safe from the dangers of copy right infringement.

The moon glows white over Brockton tonight. (a)

Not a hero to be seen (b)

A kingdom of skittering forms (c)

And it looks like I'm the Queen (b)

It was a decent opening, but I knew I could make it better. I had penned up several more versions of the later lyrics and was much more comfortable with them, but this opening was incredibly frustrating. The notebook I had been focusing on was smacked out of my hand and sent flying into a wall.

Ahh yes, speaking of frustrating, it was my friendly neighborhood bullies. They still managed to be incredibly frustrating during the times when I still bothered to go to school. You'd think that roughly two centuries of exposure would make me immune to their influence, but a combination of only keeping up appearances in sporadic loops and the loops now consistently lasting long enough for me to mostly forget about their existence made for an unpleasant relapse whenever I associated with them for long.

They hurled their usual abuse on me and I wondered why I bothered to take it. I could crush them the same way most people crushed ants, my range extended across most of the city by this point, and I was paranoid enough to keep far more than the natural number of combat useful bugs in my immediate presence. Heh.

"The school is buzzing from my swirling swarm inside." I muttered to myself. It wasn't a bad improv. The bullies had changed the focus of their mocking, jeeringly asking me what I was talking about, whether I had gone crazy on them.

"Couldn't keep them out, heaven knows they tried." I spoke louder. Nothing could keep my swarm out, not in any long term basis. And why not let these idiots hear my song, it's not like they could do anything about it anyway. And you know what, I'm not in the mood for this anymore. I'll just pull a Carrie and cover the bitches in a few bugs. It's been such a long time since I did a loop where Taylor Hebert was a notorious villain from the start.

"Don't let them win." I quickly changed the line from the version about not letting Lung kill anyone. This was great. I was so inspired!

"Don't let them see." I called my swarm toward me. No need to bother with subtlety. I dodged a clumsy attempt at a shove from Madison. Heh. Seems that they don't like being ignored in favor of poetry. Well, they'll get more than enough attention for their taste in just a few seconds.

"Be the good girl you've always had to be" I was, usually. Heroics were easier on my conscious and my life was easier when the system was motivated to work in my favor. I'd never really, truly, cut lose and given in to my darker urgings. Because it was wrong, doing those sorts of things to innocent people would make me a monster.

"But it's not real." I breathed out, only realizing the truth of this statement as I made it. Considering I had spoken in verse and even held the note for an appropriate length of time, I may have been thinking about this song a bit to much. Let's see, the next two lines had to rhyme.

"Can't let them know." If I did the sorts of things I was thinking about, all of my friends would turn on me. They'd be so disappointed and disgusted, I'm not sure I could handle that. But my darker impulses had a rebuttal for that.

"Well, they won't know" Next loop all of their memories would be gone. They'd be back to all the people I knew before hand. I just had to decide that this time didn't count. They weren't really my friends, they were just puppets that sounded like it. That was some flimsy logic, and I could already see it leading to trouble later on, but right then I just didn't care.

It seemed the discussion had progressed while I was having my moral epiphany, one of the interchangeable generic bitches had ended up on the floor, and it appeared that Sophia was coming in for a gut punch. Fortunately, my real friends for this loop had arrived.

"Let 'em swarm!" I belted out in uncharacteristic glee as Sophia was buried under a wave of wasps. "Let 'em swarm!" I continued as spiders and beetles and bees and flies and a hundred other types of insects burst out from the walls and ceilings to liberally coat my tormentors. Of course, I didn't stop there. Everywhere in the city that my power could reach I was sowing chaos just for the sake of watching things happen. School was my main focus, but I'd never had problems with multi-tasking.

"Won't hold them back anymore.

Let 'em swarm.

Let 'em swarm.

Run away and slam that door."

Aside from a last minute adjustment inspired by Madison and Emma's retreat, my song was back on the course I had intended for Lung. Pity he happened to be outside my range at the moment, luring a giant rage dragon to Winslow sounded hilarious.

"I don't care,

How you're going to pray

Let my swarm feast on

My bugs never bothered me anyway."

In for a penny, in for a pound. If I was going to embrace my inner monster for a loop I had no intention of half-assing it. Clothes, skin, hair; anything that could be consumed by my insects was free game. Except for Sophia at the moment, I had plans for her. But in order to enact them, I needed to be a bit further away. I directed a few more bugs in between us and turned towards the cafeteria. Maybe it was just because of the cockroaches taste buds, but it seemed that today's mashed potatoes were especially good. I navigated through the halls, granting Sophia a brief respite when I felt I was far enough away. As I expected, she was feeling threatened enough to call for backup.

Good, I could hardly conquer the city in a day if the Protectorate had time to prepare an adequate response. I felt like I was forgetting something… Oh, right. The song!

"Its funny how perspective

Makes everyone seem small

And the forces that once corralled me

Can't effect me at all."

It was true, nothing in this world could provide a real threat to me anymore. Contessa and Eidolon could usually still manage to kill me, but it's not like that had any real effect. I'd even gotten Grey boy'd in one unpleasant loop. While I hadn't enjoyed the after-effects, it's not like it had actually slowed me down at all.

I laughed to myself. This song was such a perfect fit for becoming a full time villain, why had I ever wanted to use it for the first steps of a villain as hesitant as Skitter?

"It's time to show how I can dream. To test the limits and make you scream." My voice was broadcast throughout my swarm, there was no sense in putting on a performance if there wasn't anyone to hear it. Now was there?

"No right, no wrong, no rules for me." I could do anything and none of it would matter. Killing Scion had gone so perfectly and I still wound up back here. I'd let him win and it was locker time. Flee to some uninhabited world, guess where you wake up in a few years! Nothing I did mattered because it was all wiped away like rain on a windshield. "I'm free." I held the note and tried to keep my voice steady. A life devoid of consequences, power enough to break a planet in easy reach, enough time to make every possible choice, and none of it mattered in the least.

"Let 'em swarm.

Let 'em swarm." I claimed my seat on one of the cafeteria tables. Sophia was being slowly being guided in my direction. The first protectorate capes would arrive on the grounds at about the same time she would locate me.

"I am one with the things that fly." I wished that I could make that statement true. If I could just dissolve my brain into my bugs then maybe I could rest for awhile. Let everything just fade away.

"Let 'em swarm, Let 'em swarm" I quieted the part of my swarm in the distance between Sophia and I. I wanted her to hear this next part from my own voice. I locked eyes with her as she burst through the doors.

"You'll never see me die." I gave her a shit eating grin as I made my pronouncement. A quick compression of a line of bugs was enough to block the shadowstate pencil she flung at my head. Silly little Sophia, weren't you listening? Even if you managed to kill me, all that would do is wipe out the rest of this world too. Not that you'll get the chance. Now that you've told Miss Militia and Velocity where I am, I don't need you around anymore.

"You I spare and you I'll slay." The first part of my sentence is directed in the direction of Mrs. Knott and the second is directed towards Mr. Gladly. And everyone else too I supposed. It wasn't like Shadow Stalker was important enough to merit her own line.

"Let my swarm feast on." And so they did. Shadow Stalker was dead in seconds once I decided I didn't want to play with her anymore. I drew my breath in to complete the verse but was interrupted by the explosion of the glass wall behind me. Hannah that clever girl had shifted her sniper rifle into a grenade launcher the second I had pulled her barrel off center. I suppose I should give credit to one of the most experienced heroes in the world, she sometimes even managed to surprise me.

Velocity, on the other hand was nothing impressive. Jumping in through the newly made opening was an obvious move, and when he was in midair, he wouldn't able to maneuver no matter how fast he was. The red blur flipping through the air to crash into the tables made for a mildly amusing visual as he clotheslined himself on a line of spider silk I had thoughtfully prepared for him.

"My power scurries through the air and on the ground." I do hope they didn't expect for just the two of them to be enough. I wasn't hearing any chatter about the e.t.a of any of their other forces.

"My soul is buzzing in humming hives all around." Perhaps if I took down three of their members while keeping time with an improvised melody they would give me something resembling an actual challenge? Speaking of which, I should make sure to quickly eliminate Panacea if I bother with New Wave. She's always such a bother if she knows I'm coming. On the other hand, wasn't that just what I was asking for. My grin widened. I imagined I looked rather manic by this point. But as relaxing as it was to just let it all go and crush my enemies…

"And one thought always remains unto the last.

I'm always looping back. The past is not my past"

They wouldn't understand those lyrics. This version was completely worthless for any other situation. And yet they were the truest thing I had said all day.

"Let 'em swarm. Let 'em swarm." Miss Militia and Velocity had succumbed at some point. I found myself in the school courtyard with no real memory of how I got there. I had held on to the myself as Khepri much longer than usual. Was I still feeling the after affects? How potentially fascinating. If brain damage could carry over to some degree then other things could as well.

"And I'll break like the golden dawn." This had been a triumphant line in the original. But here it was an acknowledgement, if I was gaining damage in the loops, losing out humanity in favor of my shard, then I would end up not better than Scion in the end. I couldn't quite bring myself to care.

"Let 'em swarm. Let 'em swarm." I continued my song, I was close enough to the end that it would be a shame not to finish, even if some of the fun had gone out of it. "Your sheltered world is gone." This line I made louder near the incoming cape forces. Armsmaster ignored me as he so often did, but the wards and the rest were quite disquieted. I decided on a whim to try and keep Clockblocker alive as the heroes massed themselves before me. Vista was trying desperately to give them a bit of space to operate in, and I let her have a bit of success so they could properly appreciate my closing lines.

"Here I stand in the light of day." I struck a defiant pose. This was going to wind up on the internet somehow or another, might as well look as good as I can when it does.

"Let my swarm feast on!" I held the line for just long enough for the heroes to realize how little there actually was left for my bugs to eat. I was confident my kill count surpassed Shatterbird's trigger.

"My bugs never bothered me anyway." My bugs and I spoke that line in a cold, serious voice as I collapsed my swarm into a much tighter mass to block the heroes line of sight. As I began to engage them in earnest it occurred to me that this little stunt would provide an excellent sales pitch to the Nine. I smiled. A group I hadn't actually joined before, an easy way to get Riley to check over my shard, and an excellent excuse to do every naughty little thing I thought of? I was much more confident in my self diagnoses of brain damage because that sounded like an excellent idea. And I always had an easy out if it wasn't.

The last sound that the Brockton Bay Branch of the Protectorate ever heard in that loop had only a vague resemblance to laughter.

* * *

A video of Let Them Swarm (5.15) can be found at at the youtube url: watch?v=jrWxyoSksYw


	6. Chapter 6

6.1 (readerboy7)

"You blew up a meth lab. A meth lab. Do you have any idea of what your actions caused, Weaver?"

"Less druggies on the streets? Skidmark making less money?"

"Well, yes, but - six civilians are in the hospital for second degree burns and overdose. How do you know there aren't others out there? You could have killed someone!"

"Actually I had my bugs check the area before they blew them up. No one inside at all."

"How do you even blow up a bui- wait. 'Them'? There were more labs?"

"Only ten or so."

"Only ten?! Are you &#^!ing serious?! Why do I have a feeling that Lung actually hasn't been more active recently? First the incedent with Shadow Stalker, then the thing with the bank, now THIS? You'll be reassigned to Alsaka in a week. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need a fricking drink."

* * *

6.2 (Prim-the-Amazing)

Paige followed Dragon's advice. Under Lustrum's eye, she denounced men as a gender, spewing hatred and misandry. When away though, she quieted down, thoughtful, regretful. Just with one heated moment, one thoughtless comment, and she'd demolished her entire life, filled with so much potential. She could have been a super star. And now she was a sex felon, locked forever away in the Birdcage, for life.

Eventually, she forced herself to forget her old life, the outside world. Her world and life narrowed down to the Birdcage, and just the Birdcage. She'd have a new life, a smaller life, here, in jail.

The entire prison seemed to work on some sort of barter system, trading books and cloth and favors and sex and more. She entered the system, selling her performances, gaining a reputation as someone who could sing you into a bliss unparalleled by any drug. Lustrum expected a certain cut due to her protection, but Paige still kept enough to live comfortably.

There were thirteen cell leaders in the Birdcage.

Acidbath, Galvanate, Teacher, Lab Rat, Marquis, Gavel, Lustrum, Black Kaze, Glaistig Uaine, String Theory, Crane, and Ingenue. And then there was the thirteenth leader. She'd been incarcerated only a few months before Paige, and she'd heard and watched and read about it in the news. A slaughter. A young fifteen year old girl who had apparently been viciously bullied for some time had been shoved into a locker full of rotting, bloody tampons for hours, had triggered, and when she'd gotten out she'd gone a bloody rampage, killing every last single person in her school, going out of her way to torture her main three tormenters. Soon the capes had arrived on the scene, and she'd handed herself in without a fight. There had only been twelve cell blocks with leaders before she arrived, but… apparently she'd taken over one within a day, easily.

In a way, Paige felt immensely sorry for her. But at the same time, she was also terrified. She was a poor, bullied girl, but at the same time, she was also a mass murderer.

Taylor Hebert.

She called herself Khepri.

"Today is the monthly cell meeting." Lustrum suddenly said.

"Okay," Paige said.

"I want you to come with me, as a lieutenant. If things come to a fight, I want you to sing and order everyone to go back to their respective cells."

She looked up at the much taller woman, eyes wide. If things come to a fight. She shuddered. Paige didn't like violent situations. But she nodded anyway. Paige had been targeted a few times now by men who wanted to use her power for gain and pleasure, and the only thing that had protected her then was Lustrum. She needed for the older cape to like and want to protect her, and that entailed doing as she said.

They went.

Paige's mouth was dry and her palms were sweaty. She was standing behind Lustrum's right shoulder, and all of the other cell block leaders were present. Except Khepri.

A door banged open and a fifteen year old girl lazily waltzed in, with all the eyes in the room, some glaring, at her. She didn't seem to notice. She flopped down in her seat, crossing her legs on the corner of the table they were using.

"You're late." Gavel said.

"I overslept." She said dismissively.

She wore a baggy grey version of the uniform, her long, dark hair unbrushed and tangled, greasy. She wore glasses and her eyes were half lidded, her posture loose and limp. She was tall for a girl her age, and thin and gangly like many teenagers in the middle of a growth spurt. Paige didn't think she'd be quite able to judge how pretty she was with any objectivity, as she was at the moment covered in bugs. Not completely, but you could see the fleas and lice in her hair and on her clothes, the spiders and cockroaches and centipedes and other creepy crawlies crawling over her skin and down underneath her clothes which Khepri easily ignored. Paige felt bile rise in her throat.

And then she looked straight at Paige, gave her a lopsided grin, and winked. Paige's heart wouldn't slow down to its normal speed until she was back Lustrum's block. She winced when she accidentally thought of it as home.

She had many customers. They paid with books, favors, clothes, and more. She kept the things she thought she'd use, gave Lustrum her cut, and traded off the rest for more things she thought she'd like. She made sure to keep her songs wordless melodies, free of any orders. The customers were always happy with her service, and Paige needed a day planner to keep track of whenever she had a singing session.

But when a cell block leader comes to you and asks for a song, even without a payment or a reservation, you damn well cancel what you've got planned for the day and sing.

Khepri, just as lazy and ruffled as the last time Paige saw her, stood before her, smirking.

"Well?" She raised an eyebrow. "Why aren't you singing?"

Paige noticed that there were a few more wasps circling Khepri's head than normal, and they're buzzing was beginning to get louder, and they were flying faster. The threat was clear.

Paige sang.

She sang happy songs, she sang for hours, and Khepri slumped against her shoulder with a relieved sigh, and Paige began shaking when the bugs crawling on her spread out onto her, but they didn't bite or sting, so she continued.

"Best vacation ever," Khepri mumbled.

Paige didn't understand.

"You dare threaten one of my girls into doing as you say?" Lustrum hissed, seething. She held so tightly onto Paige's wrists that she had to restrain whimpers. That was going to bruise. She hadn't wanted this. She didn't know what she'd expected when she told Lustrum about what had happened, but it wasn't this.

Khepri shot Lustrum a look that was filled with less respect than she held for her own bugs.

In her anger, Lustrum's grip grew even tighter. A pained sound escaped, but Lustrum's grip didn't loosen. Khepri's eyes narrowed, and then she sighed in an exasperated sort of way and rolled her eyes. She held out her left arm. Lustrum looked at it, uncomprehending.

"What?"

"You want retribution, right? So take it. I'm terrible with arms anyway, I was bound to lose it at some point, better have it be on my own terms. Lose my own head next." Khepri chuckled darkly.

Paige didn't understand, didn't want to.

"You have a regeneration power?" Lustrum asked, surprised.

"No. Just bugs." Khepri replied simply.

Lustrum glared, suspicious. But then she grabbed the cleaver which she kept tucked by the elastic line in her pants, and her arm blurred. There was a thump, so much blood, and Paige screamed.

Khepri's hissed between her teeth quietly, as if she'd cut her finger while peeling potatoes.

At the next meeting Khepri still only had one arm. She overslept again.

"Sing for me." She said.

Paige stared at her, shocked. Speechless, she looked pointedly at Khepri's stump. The younger girl took her point.

"Oh, who gives a fuck about arms? Happiness is worth it. I think I'll save you just to keep you for myself, next time. I had no idea your singing was that delicious." She said glibly.

Paige didn't understand.

But she sang. And she didn't tell Lustrum, this time. Or the next time, or the time after that, and so on.

* * *

6.3 (Prim-the-Amazing)

Danny Hebert knew his daughter. Sure, they never really talked much anymore outside of empty small talk, and they never went out of their way to spend time with each other except for meals. But they were still family, and he still loved her, so he knew her. Simply put in a sentence, Taylor was a shy, quiet, stubborn, lonely, decent, smart girl with her father's temper. And that was that.

Danny had never seen such a sudden and complete personality shift in the span of one day. It was the day after winter holidays, the first school day after vacation, and everything had been normal. They'd had bacon and eggs, and Taylor had smiled glumly at him and gone off to catch the bus. And then he'd come home, and they'd had dinner.

Taylor had changed clothes and showered for some reason, and she had dinner ready for when he came. He didn't know what it was, but it tasted as good as it looked and smelled. There was something different about her posture… her shoulders were less slumped. Her back straighter, her chin raised a few inches, her eyes easily meeting his gaze, voice clearer and louder, less stuttering in general, really. Confident.

"Did anything happen at school today, Taylor?" He asked.

"Nothing out of the ordinary," she said and flashed a lopsided grin, as if indulging in some private joke of hers.

"Really? You seem… different." He tried.

She shrugged. They went back to eating, and the discussion only came back to life some minutes later.

"Hey, dad?"

He looked at her to indicate that he was listening.

"I feel like I've been trapped in a sort of routine for some time. Do you have any suggestions for anything fun to do?" She didn't look like she expected a good answer, and he tried not to feel too slighted.

He thought.

"You could join a club."

"Been there, done that. It feels sometimes like I've joined every team- I mean club, in town."

"Really? You've joined clubs?"

She began to look slightly panicked.

"O-oh yeah. There was the Under… knitters. The Underknitters. And then the War- book club! The war book club! We read books. About war. Yes." Taylor shoved a forkful of food into her mouth.

"A knitting circle and a war themed book club are hardly all the clubs in town, Taylor." He said dubiously.

"Well there was New Wave!"

"What?"

She paled.

"I mean the New Wave fan club!"

"Oh,"

"And then there was Faul- ty government. We, um, tried to uncover conspiracies hidden by the government." She beamed like she had just said something terribly clever.

"Huh. You do way more stuff than I thought you did, Taylor."

"Well, that's me! Miss Adventurous! I'm serious, you give me a half interesting suggestion and I will do it. I mean, do you have any idea how many times I've been a member of the Slaughter- society? Which is… an apprenticeship… for young, aspiring… butchers."

"Really."

"And then there was Über- awesome baking society. Which was where I learned how to make this meal!"

"And what a good meal it is."

"Yes. I've been a partner of Circus- fanatics, which record the travels of renowned circuses around North America. For god's sake, I've even been in the Merchant's- GUILD! IN AN RPG!"

"My. You certainly get up to a lot of things, Taylor."

"Yup. That I do. Now let's talk about something else, okay? Please?"

Definitely, his daughter was acting strangely. But she actually seemed a bit happier than before, or at least more confident, and she was still his daughter. So he loved her.

Although that was a lot of clubs.

* * *

6.4 (Query)

"Because I'm done. My life is over, for all intents and purposes. No matter how hard I try from here on out, I'll never do anything one ten-thousandth as important as what I was doing before."

It was words she spoke over a thousand lifetimes ago, words that she relished and yet hated all the same.

Because Taylor Hebert was important and it was her importance that sentenced her to this fate.

Because this wasn't the end or rather there really was no such thing as the end.

Only a constant never ending loop.

She awoke staring at the off color white of the hospital ceiling.

It was testament to her experience with these scenario's that it took only a few seconds to realize when and where she was.

General Hospital, Philadelphia, Earth Aleph

Two or Three months after what they would call the Golden Morning.

The slight sound of rustling fabric gave away the nurse that was checking her chart.

"Ehrrm"

Her mouth failed to form the proper words requesting the correct date and time.

Ah, such an interesting feeling, brain damage.

Calmly she tried testing to see what parts of her were functioning.

Legs no, arms no, neck no, eyes yes!

Quickly she blinked her eyes, frantically trying to convey a message.

She cursed when she remembered that this blonde headed nurse didn't know Morse code. It was the black haired one that usually appeared after blonde ones shift, that recognized the erratic blinking for what it was.

Disappointing.

Taylor closed her eyes and out of habit began to compile her mental itinerary.

Recover.(Annoying)

Find Medical or Scalpel and regain passenger and limb.(Might be useful to ask for light cosmetic surgery as well.)

Build a better replacement limb!

Update passenger and eliminate default bonding restrictions.

Find SugarRush and utilize his ability to quickly build a Portal Ripper(or maybe a Warpslider?).

Warn Lisa and relevant others about unrestricted Scion triggers.

Also might help to warn them about invadin-

"Taylor!"

Her mental plan collapsed as the familiar sound of her dad's voice cut through her thoughts.

The hospital bed she was on squeaked as her Dad's form settled beside her and his blurry face swam into view.

2b. Also have Medical fix vision.

She tried to give a reassuring smile but her brain was once more failing to cooperate forcing her to try to reassure dad through her eyes.

It wasn't very successful.

Post!GoldenMorning

Looping Taylor

* * *

6.5 (Zulaq)

Lisa really had no clue why things had suddenly gone insane. Sure, her power let her determine that she actually was in the past, and this wasn't some crazy power induced dream, but it was drawing a headache inducing blank on the why.

When she had woken up in her bed at the old Undersiders HQ, as in the HQ that had been blown up, she had first suspected somebody was using a power on her to make her think she was in the past. But things were just so realistic, everything she used her power on came up normal, so either somebody had some power which interfered with her own, or she really was in the past.

So she decided to fuck it, and treat everything like it really was real. Either she would get to correct some mistakes others, and occasionally herself, made, and/or she'll try to push the boundaries of whatever power was making her hallucinate.

The first thing on her list was to kill Coil, the man needed to die, if only for her own protection. If he knew she knew what she knew, he would kill her, no if ands or buts. So she needed to kill him first, which actually turned out to be fairly easy. She knew his power and his identity, it was a simple matter to track him down in his civilian identity, make a call to him in order to trick him into splitting the timeline, and then arrange an accident. Easy.

Now that that was taken care of, Lisa was tracking down an old friend. She had many regrets about how things had gone in Brockton, but she knew that Taylor had even more. And now Lisa was in a position to prevent Taylor from making those mistakes in the first place, which should be easy without Coil in the picture. That was why she was standing in front of a nondescript house, having just rung the doorbell.

The door creaked open, but a chain prevented it from opening more than a couple of inches. "Who is it?" a grumpy female voice on the other side asked. Annoyed, wasn't expecting company.

Weary. Tired. Exasted, more than just sleepy. Doesn't want to be disturbed.

Odd, Lisa had always known that Taylor tended to be cautious, but she hadn't really thought that she was so weary. "I'm here to speak to Taylor Hebert about a prospective job opportunity."

"Go home and tell Coil to fuck off, Tattletale."

Geh? Knows Coil. Doesn't like him, personal. Knows me by voice. Knows my cape identity. Knows me?! Also time traveler? Knows more about it than me.

"Taylor, you'd better get out here right this minute and explain why the world's gone crazy, and we've gone back in time or I'll tell your father you're a cape!"

"Wha- Lisa? You know? You're Awake?"

Awake emphasized, definitely knows me

"I don't know what you mean, but you've got five seconds to open this door and explain, or I'm calling the Dockworkers Union and asking for your father."

The door opened, and Lisa was glomped.

* * *

6.6 (Rex)

"I call bullshit!"

"What? I totally finished the Fugly Bob's challenger once. Died a bit afterwards cause of a burst stomach lining, but-"

"Not that! This! Taylor, you're using your mind control powers to do this aren't you? There's no way you set this up in a week."

I looked up from my view of the beach. Alec and Lisa were standing beside me on the roof of my lair. I raised an eyebrow at him. Silently asking both if he thought I would cheat like that, and why it was appropriate to distract me from the dancers when the Las Vegas branch of the Protectorate was going by. As annoying as those bastards were, they managed to look damn good in those garter belts.

"Nope. I didn't use any mind control to make the Protectorate do this down Brockton Bay beach." I flipped open my pocket watch to check the time. Hmm… about thirty seconds left. "Don't need to when I can make Cauldron arrange it for me." I closed the watch with a satisfying click and slipped it back into the pocket of my immaculately fitted designer three piece spider silk suit. Weaver Clothier's still counted as a designer brand even if I hadn't gone into the clothing business in sixty-seven loops.

"By the way, what's up with the watch, there's got to be a better way to tell the time than that old thing. Come to think of it, I don't recall you ever wearing a suit before." Regent tried to distract me from the fact that I had won our bet by changing the subject. It wouldn't do him any good, but the combination of seeing Chevalier and Myrrdin enthusiastically doing high kicks and the imminent arrival of our special guest made me decide to let it go for now. I pulled out the watch again and flicked it open.

3… 2… and 1.

"She wanted to be better dressed than the competition." A new voice joins the conversation. I shut my watch with another click and turn to smile and Contessa.

"You, my dear lady, are late." She wasn't of course, but I just liked messing with her.

"My apologies. Are you the one that caused this?" She gestured out to the beach. The long procession continued by. It really was rather impressive that they had managed to organize this thing in just a week. The flyers formed a second line in the air above the beach at just the right height to give me, Regent, and Tattletale a show, while the non-flyers struggled on the beach. Everyone was, of course, wearing modified costumes. Dennis had no right to be better in high heels than I had been.

"Well, you're the one that dealt with the details, but yeah, it was me." I launched into my prepared speech. "You arranged this because it became the best way to create an army. It became the best way to make an army because I decided to tell you the method to reliably clone parahumans only if you set this up." I smirked in Regent's direction. "No master powers were used at all and everyone here is here out of their own free will which means I win." I stuck my tongue out at Regent. He cordially threw me the bird. I turned my attention back to Contessa.

"In order to reliably clone parahumans, you need three tinkers. I'll give you their names and a warning to go with each one. The first parahuman is Blasto. The first warning is not to clone Eidolon or Greyboy. Eidolon, in addition to other negative side effects, just burns through his power faster. Greyboy resets back to his original self and the benefits he provides to your goals are not worth the hassle of wrangling him. Second parahuman is Bonesaw. Second warning, save your cloned parahumans for Scion, if you start using them in Endbringer battles the Simurgh will just interrupt and wreck the whole project before you lot make any real progress. Also, clone the three tinkers as soon as you can manage. The fewer critical failure points your army has, the better. Finally, Cranial. You need to match the DNA and approximate memories of a given parahuman in order to make a clone. After they've been decanted and their powers set, you've got the problem of managing the personalities of all these parahumans. The easy way around that is to wipe their memories after they've finished developing and replace it with the memories of someone loyal to your goals. The warning is to use someone that doesn't have the capability to trigger. You don't want to know what can happen if you don't." There, that should be everything they should need. Simurgh would almost certainly ruin the project anyway, but it's not like I actually needed the clones' help to beat the golden moron anyway.

"Would you like to join Cauldron?"

I hadn't expected that. Hm.

"Up to you Regent. You wanna be in charge of running the world?"

"Nah, now shut up. The Triumvirate's coming." He giggled like a small child. It was him. It was most certainly not me.

"Well, that concludes our business." I waved a dismissive hand towards Contessa. "You should get back in line, you're almost" I made air quotes with my fingers "on stage." She turned and walked through the Door to take her place in line. Smiling, I settled down to watch the most powerful organization on Earth do the can-can so that I could win a bet.

Regent was laughing hysterically as Eidolon flounced majestically through the air in the frilliest, pinkest dress Contessa had managed to acquire. That was a lot of pink and frill. Alexandria was comparatively boring, doing a machine perfect rendition of the can-can with a neutral look on her face. While Eidolon was clearly infuriated that he had to do this, I was sure Alexandria was a mentally a million miles away. Probably playing go against herself again.

"It's a pity we didn't get the Yangban and the birdcage involved in this. With the right boosters Legend can form his own section." I murmured to my compatriots as Legend danced past, flinging multicolored lasers out with every kick and twist. It was properly coordinated with the music, the colors of the costumes of the people the firework lasers went off behind, and the setting sun. He was clearly embracing his love of dance.

"Legend laser lightshow can-can is the best can-can." Lisa agreed from my left. It was something of a pity that Legend was a superhero, his calling was clearly on Broadway.

"Wait, you guys have done this before!?" Regent squawked from my right.

"Yep, done it when Scion was actually attacking too. So we got ALL the parahumans under much greater pressure." I pointed down to the end of the line, where Contessa, Doctor Mother, the Numberman, the Clairvoyant, the Doormaker were doing their best to celebrate their soon to be acquired bounty. "That's what it means to be in the loops Regent, we can do anything and everything if we want too. And since we're stuck here for a nigh eternal span of time, eventually we're going to want to do everything." I paused before conscientiously adding "at least Twice."

Lisa shrugged. "We still haven't managed to get Behemoth to join in, but that's only a matter of time."

"Tch. I never had a chance of winning this bet in the first place." Regent crossed his arms and tried to pretend he wasn't sulking.

"Nope!" I happily chirped. "Which means I have ten loops where I can call it in and you have to cross-dress as a woman for the loop. Along with whatever other goal I set for you to do." And once I got him to sign the paper we had drawn up before hand, I could use it on an unawakened Regent any time after I'd gotten him sufficiently drunk.

* * *

6.7 (NoSolution)

It was nice now that Sam was awake with me, it presented so many more opportunities that would have otherwise been to time consuming to reach. So what if I'm lazy? It's not like I don't have all the time in the world. Oh. Wait.

When Sam first awoke and contacted me I was overjoyed at all the shenanigans that could present themselves. We at first decided to test Cauldron's to contingencies.

A few hundred loops later and we were still seeing their reaction timing. And their reactions.

We finally managed to get to a particular scenario where we could initialize Project Death Threat.

I was currently situated in one of the large abandoned warehouses at the Docks. I had four major devices occupying the room each displaying a clock counting down somewhere on it. The first one and the smallest was simply a computer with numerous accessories such as a webcam the screen depicted 00:02:50. The second one resembled a bomb on a railgun, probably because it was. The clock on the railgun stated 00:12:50 as it slowly counted down ominously. The third one which was the largest and the most dangerous, or the safest depending on your perspective was a simple metal sphere to prevent anything from interfering with it. A small control panel jutted out stating 00:32:50. The last one, and the one I was in was a rather ordinary locker, so what if I like symbolism? The locker was purposefully designed to contain until time ran out and protect whatever inside the container safe from anything and everything. The lock closing the door instead of a combination, was a clock stating 00:42:50.

Just over 8 minutes ago I had entered the locker and simultaneously Sam created a PHO account under the name of Simurgh, approved it, gave her the title of (Verified Cape) and then created a thread under the Simurgh subsection of the forum.

Topic: Brockton Bay

In: BoardsEndbringersSimurgh

Simurgh (Original Poster)(Verified Cape)

A moment ago

After a while the upper atmosphere gets boring.

I heard that Brockton Bay is a nice play to visit so I thought I'd check it out. Any advice on what to do? I'm definitely going to talk to the locals and any other tourists who show up. Anyone interested in a meet-up?

As Jack Slash wiped some imaginary blood off of his knives and simultaneously augmenting his kill count he had a sudden thought.

"I can't help but think that there is someplace that I should be right now, I feel like I'm missing out on some great action..."

I smiled as the Endbringer sirens went off. All according to plan. I counted down as I peered through the slots if the locker, this was it. 10...9...8...7...6...5...4...3...2...1...0! Show time!

The clock flickered and disappeared from the screen, it was then replaced with a video showing the inside of the Brockton Bay PRT headquarters.

I loudly began with my speech, "Hello world! Well, technically Brockton Bay PRT headquarters, affiliates and Parahumans but whatever. It is the nefarious, evil criminal mastermind and super villain Taylor Hebert! And! If my demands are not met I will destroy the Simurgh! MUHUHAHAHA-the screen flickered and the image of the capes disappeared-HAhaha..." Well that wasn't very nice...

When Emma and I had joked about Taylor losing it... Well who knew we'd be right? I hated Taylor even more than I thought I ever could, who does she think she is? Interrupting an Endbringer briefing and then threatening me! While she was in a LOCKER! She was so... So... Infuriating! I brought up my crossbow, aimed, and fired.

I could barely stop myself from laughing. This was going to be good. So good. I unfortunately couldn't stop my trademark grin creeping onto my face as the locker on the screen spoke.

Grue nudged me, "Tattle, what's up with that girl?"

Regent piped up, "She's crazy that's what. Think she's single?"

Grue's and mine answer to him was two words long, synced and well practiced as well as the accompanying slap to the head.

"Hey, physco-shadow knows that girl in her civvies."

"Not now, Tats."

"Why not?"

"Shut up Regent," that was practiced as well.

Alexandria was the first one to speak after the arrow impaled the screen, "Dragon, see if you can trace the signal. Low priority. We can deal with this after the fight assuming it's a prank and an ill-suited one at that. Shadow Stalker, from your reaction I assume you know something about this Taylor Hebert?"

"Not much but she's crazy definitely crazy. I've heard about her, she's a pompous jerk.

The clock on the railgun-bomb thigy reached zero and sent the bomb crashing through the roof pass defending capes and into the Simurgh. As soon as it touched her she disappeared as well as the bomb.

I smirked all according to plan, now for the next phase.

Dragon would have sighed if she could she couldn't trace the signal at all and now that girl, Taylor was on the armbands, what next? A threat to save the world from a multi-dimensional near omniscient monster? Sure, she did... Something to the Simurgh, her sensors weren't picking up anything but did she have to be so... Stupid. Humans. Dragon didn't think she'd ever be able to understand them.

"MUHUHAHAHA! You thought you got rid of me! No! I am still here! You cut me off and so I was forced to terminate the Simurgh! Now unless my demands are made I will destroy Scion to prove just how evil I really am!"

I chose to intervene then, "This is Dragon, we will hear your demands."

"Ahhhh! THE Dragon? I am such a big fan! A pleasure to meet you as for my demands... Can I have the autographs of some capes please? You have 10 minutes! Thanks and bye now!

* * *

6.8 (Zulaq)

Running a hand through her hair, Taylor complained to herself that she didn't like sand. It's coarse, and rough and irritating, and it gets everywhere. It had been a couple of days, and she was still finding sand in awkward places.

Of course, she admitted to herself, she really shouldn't expect any better after her current backstory of being from a planet which was one big desert. It had only been luck that the local heroes (who didn't seem to be awake) had been passing through, much less that she had just the right skills to aid them. Even if the heroes didn't seem to be the most conscientious people around. Seriously, who enters a nine year old into a hi-speed race, where almost all the competitors were expected to cheat, and still expect her to win?

Still she had won the race, and her freedom from that flying blue muppet, too bad they couldn't free her father. She had plans to return and free him herself, but that would take time, and besides she still needed to meet with this council. Although based on what she's seen so far, Taylor wouldn't bet on this council being much better than the Protectorate in terms of restrictions on her.

Well, she had to give the Jedi this, they knew how to build to impress. The Jedi Temple on Coruscant was so much better than the Brocton Protectorate's converted oil rig, and probably had better defenses to boot. But seeing how quiet and serene the hallways were only reinforced her impression that the Jedi path probably wasn't for her. But still, Qui Gon expected her to meet the Jedi Council and be tested, and it really was the least she could do for the man who'd freed her (even if she did have her own plan already in motion to gain her freedom herself).

So as she entered the Council chambers, she found exactly what she expected, a bunch of old men, women and aliens of indeterminate gender sitting in a circle ready to pronounce judgment. Then the wrinkly old green alien who seemed to command the most respect winked at her. "Humm… So you are the one Master Qui Gon believes should be trained to be a Jedi, hummm…" He/She/It narrowed its eyes in an exaggerated motion. "I private meeting is in order, I believe."

One of the other's present, a tall, bald black human, balked. "But Master-"

The alien rapped its cane on the ground. "Perfectly fine I shall be. The only question shall be if this young one can stay Awake."

Qui Gon bowed, "It shall be as you wish, Master."

And so the stuffy old people shuffled out of the room, leaving Taylor alone with the green, apparently Awake alien. Taylor watched the Jedi Master carefully, but she was surprised when the old being lept up and made a beeline towards her. Standing up, she could see that the alien only stood about her not-very-impressive nine-year-old self's height.

Still, it came as a surprise when the alien whacked her head with its staff. "About time you showed up! Do you have any idea how long I've been waiting Taylor? Eight. Hundred. Fucking. Years. Eight hundred years with some of the most stuck up, pretentious, celibate and annoying monks in the galaxy! And this body! I'm green! And short! I know you told me looping could be weird, but this takes the cake!"

Wait a minute, the only one she's introduced to the loops so far is, "Lisa?"

Lisa hit Taylor on the head again, "Who else would I be, idiot!"

Taylor couldn't help it, she burst out laughing.

* * *

Prim-the-Amazing:

The red light saber swooshed down and-

God fucking damn it! Couldn't she just go one Loop without losing an arm!? Was that too much too ask for!?

"Taylor," the Big Bad said. "I am your mother."

"You... you just cut off my arm." She said dazedly caught off guard by the admission.

The Evil Overlord seemed flustered by having this pointed out to her.

"T-Together we can rule the galaxy, mother and daughter!" She rallied on.

Taylor stared at her. Annette Hebert shifted, embarrassed.

"Well... Okay. I can get to know you, and being a Jedi is super boring anyways. Way too much meditation for my tastes, too little action."

"Wait, really?" Darth Vaderina asked, excited.

"Sure. Let's get our tyrant on, mom." Taylor smiled.

This was going to be fun. She couldn't wait to see Han Solo's face when he saw her rule the solar systems with an iron fist alongside the seemingly most evil person to ever be born in the universe! It was going to be hilarious.

* * *

6.9 (ir_fane)

Dan sighed, rubbing his aching temples. His little girl was in a mood again. It was a good mood, true, and those had been rare enough in the past that almost any cure was welcome. Somehow, that didn't make his stress levels go down much when she brought home a set of powerful criminals as her 'harem'. If they weren't so blatantly terrified of (disappointing) her, he didn't know what he'd do. On the other hand, they were terrified of (disappointing) her, so they were kind of amusing, in an abstractly horrifying way. Made him a bit tense, but he could deal. He was used to dealing with tension. Imagining how she'd ... wow , there went that headache. Imagining how she'd been successful in 'recruiting' them was ... worse.

And she wasn't being very subtle about her 'costumes', lying around her room, or with stressing critical words... on the other hand, the last couple of times she'd done this, she hadn't spent as much time at home.

Dan sighed, and tossed the newspaper in the trash. At least she wasn't calling herself 'jitterbug' this time. He still remembered his father explaining why it was a word for people who couldn't dance.

* * *

6.10 (readerboy7)

This loop had started out near-baseline. Sure, there was apparently someone called Genoscythe the Eyeraper, but I knew practically nothing about him other than his name. Bakuda and Armsmaster had said "Meh, I could take her" right before we started fighting, and Lung had said the same in chinese. No-one else was Awake, and I was following baseline for the most part. But then I arrived at the Leviathan fight, and I realised that I had been falling down the rabbit-hole all this time.

Legend was giving his typical speech, talking about one in four people dying, when it all changed. Instead of talking about how they never got the chance to tell us the odds, but then he talked about how he wanted to live, and he would gut any of the psychopathic manchildren in the room if they interfered with the goal. The same went for us villains.

then he got his daughter to sell us girl scout cookies (and how had she gotten in here without me noticing? also, wasn't Legend homosexual?) and started talking about the afterparty.

Great, one of these loops. hopefully it won't turn out as badly as it had when cape fights had been replaced by dance fights...

* * *

6.11 (Focus13)

The warehouse was dark and lifeless where it had once been vibrant. The stench of blood and gunpowder filled the air. A tall cloaked figure stood amongst the carnage of several still warm bodies and over turned tables of drug product. The figure, decidedly female, towered over the last living person in the warehouse, other than herself. "Jesus! Take the dope and the money, take whatever! Kaiser doesn't pay me enough to..." His speech is cut off by the female planting a knife in his throat with nary a hint of emotion. He gives a wet gurgle and has a look of terrified disbelief on his face.

He attempted to reach out at the girl crouching over him in a pleading gesture of "Help me", but the girl didn't so much as twitch a finger and simply watched him expire. Silence filled the death laden room as the cloaked assailant slowly stood and took a moment to assess the surroundings. Pointless, she thought. That she had been able to casually exterminate a dozen street soldiers of the Empire either said a lot of her prowess or her opponents incompetence. She grimaced, an unfamiliar expression on her usually stoic face. She needed challenge, refining, something to test herself. She needed... a cape. Yes, that would be the logical progression in her self examination.

She wiped the blood from her knife on her cloak, pondering this new line of thought. Who to test her capabilities on first she wondered. She was interrupted by the sound of a motorbike pulling up outside the shabby warehouse. She blinked and slowly turned her head toward the noise, factoring this new element into her plans. Armsmaster she thought. But why was he here? she inquired to herself. She turned back to the corpses, she was sure she'd kept her conflict quiet enough not to warrant attention.

No matter, something to be reflected upon later she thought. If Collin was here she could use him. A part of her mind rebelled viciously at the idea of harming someone who had once been a close friend and colleague, but she shut those impulses down hard with a quick utilization of Occlumency, returning to her near permanent state of zen-like apathy for this Loop.

She began to move up toward the rafters, wanting better positioning for what was coming. If she did any permanent damage she'd make it up to him in the next Cycle. It was becoming easier to justify her actions as of late. She blamed the Mind Arts for that. And the repetitive time travel. On the other hand, the stronger she was without the use of powers meant she'd be that much more potent the next time she needed to be Khepri.

She reached an ideal spot, giving her a superb view of the warehouses interior while concealing her in shadows. She reversed the grip on her knife, applied some final touches with her Occlumency and waited for the doors to open with bated breath.

* * *

6.12 (NoSolution)

Alexandria had just received an urgent from Director Seneca of the Alaskan branch of the PRT stating that there was an urgent matter that required her immediate attention, a situation that could apparently escalate into an S-Class scenario.

"Director Seneca," Alexandria greeted coolly as she landed in front of HQ. "I trust you haven't been kidnapped recently?"

"Is 6 hours ago recent?" the Director retorted, "We can discuss the abduction after this A-Class threat is dealt with. We currently have assigned ratings as Master 8, Brute 3, Striker 2 and Thinker 2. The target name is Kodak, don't ask. Someone made a typo in the initial encounter paperwork. Now, head North, take a left at the first igloo, then take a right at the third snow bank then go straight till you meet the target. Be careful with the target, if it gets out if control it will unleash it's full capabilities. I hope you come back alive. I barely did. Have a nice day Alexandria. May we meet again." With that the Director twirled around and marched into the building followed by the security detail assigned to him.

Alexandria stared dumbfounded for an instant but then took of, Director Seneca probably knew what was be-were those bears? In tanks laying siege to the city? Someone was going to have a talking to when she got back. She flew above the icy tundra following the Director's directions as a storm raged around her buffeting her with wind, ice, snow and hail. As she peered through the fog surrounding her scanning for the Kodak, a large dark shape came out. What... How... Who puts a football stadium in the middle of Alaska? She ascended above the height of the stadium and then accelerated towards the center of playing field. She abruptly stopped before impact and hovered just above the field. Bears. Bears everywhere. Bears in the stands, bears operating TV cameras, bears in cheer leading costumes leading routines. And on the field, there was a table with a chair on either side. In one of the chairs there was a bear. A Kodiak bear with a chess board on the table in front of him with the white side facing him, and the pawn in front of his king moved one space foward. Great, I get to match wits with a Kodiak bear Alexandria thought as she took the empty seat and moved her queenside rook pawn two spaces foward.

The game ended four moves later.

Taylor knew Lisa didn't like other thinkers. But she didn't know she disliked them this much, she was just going to keep her much shut and wait for a consensus. After all, that's why they had three thinkers.

"We are not following your plan!"

"Why not? It will guarantee victory!"

"But not her obliteration!"

"I like her first two moves. Symmetrical."

"We just need to see how smart she really is. Push her limits, play around with her and then beat her."

"No we need to obliterate her, what is your stance?"

"Personally, I would prefer a nice clean victory."

Taylor sighed, and turned to her friend, "Wonder when they'll find out the game is over?"

"96.32458264026% it won't be for another three hours."

* * *

6.13 (NoSolution)

To say Accord was upset was an understatement, he was livid. He didn't demonstrate it to one untrained in the nuances of the human body but I could see it as he moved towards me flanked by his bodyguard Citrine, his posture was more rigid than usual, his steps calculated with more caution and the biggest indication, he appeared calm. It was always a unique experience conversing with Accord, I had to make sure that all my statements were accurate, precise and concise.

"Accord, how may I assist you?" I inquired.

"Weaver," he responded, "There is a discrepancy in the plan for Sector 3. Primarily, Chevalier's power is not effective on the saw. Secondary, Tecton and his associates created a full-scale model of a sword."

"That's an unfortunate waste of resources, Chevalier's services are no longer required. Neither are the services of Tecton's Crew, they have failed us one time to many. Thank you for bringing this issue towards my attention, Accord you are relieved."

I waited until Accord had left the room and then turned towards my assistant, "Vista, please bring the Siberian and Bonesaw to me immediately. Mannequin is more than capable of defending me at the moment."

Vista bowed and then quickly left the room with the assistance of her power. I returned to gazing at the Earth, "Beautiful isn't it Mannequin? Such a splendid world, full of marvels and countless lives. Well not for long. MUHUHAHAHA! Anyways, nice base you built us, very nice. And the location! They say location is everything when living somewhere. Well, I think the Moon is prime real estate. Love what you did with the Door by the way. Find it ironic, only way into this gigantic complex kilometres wide is a small door that a human could fit through. Or a mannequin."

Just then, Bonesaw and Siberian entered, "Ah, my friends, somewhere in this complex we have an abnormally large sword. Could you dispose of it?"

"Sure! Mommy, let's go play hide-and-go-seek!" Note to self; kidnap Yamada at some point and have Bonesaw rehabilitated. But now, we needed another way to destroy the earth. A proper way this time.

"Mannequin, I think it's time we pay a visit to one of your old friends."

"Chevalier, your services are no longer required. Have a nice day."

"Wait what?"

"We have no use for you anymore. Goodbye."

"But... But... I was going to destroy the world. What am I now? Chopped liver?"

"No. That would be too messy to clean up."

I stared at Mannequin's broken body at my feet. Looks like his friend wasn't feeling that friendly.

"Come on Jack ole buddy. No hard feelings? I only stole your team... No, still mad? What if I can make it up to you? I'll let you destroy the world..."

"Fine... Just make it interesting..."

That was good, now to get back to base. That fun part! Say what you want about Squealer but she makes pretty good spaceships.

This was immensely awkward. Vista, Bonesaw, Siberian, Accord, Citrine, Jack and I were all staring up at the dome of Mannequin's habitat. Not a scratch. Mannequin had really made this place impenetrable...

Then the world exploded. Well, technically the sun which then obliterated the Earth and the moon but I doubt anyone alive really cares... My last thought before returning to the locker, was how did Bonesaw get that gigantic sword outside.

6.14 (BurnNote)

"So let me summarize, just to make sure I understand you correctly."

At this, Director Piggot collected herself for a moment.

"At 03:00 you engaged Lung and a group of ABB gang members, alone, without asking for backup, or even informing anyone. "

She waited for his confirmation, because she frankly couldn't believe a veteran like Armsmaster would commit such a blunder. But he simply nodded, as if fighting Lung wasn't a dangerous affair even with a whole team as backup.

"The, fight, rather predictably, escalated untill several of the nearby buildings were either rubble, on fire, or both."

She paused again, and this time Colin took the chance to add another inch of rope to hang himself with.

"Yes, I was testing the theory of fighting fire with fire. I must report that despite promising initial results, it has not proven effective."

She begged to differ; from the glow she could see through her window, it had proven rather too effective.

She took a deep breath, and pressed on.

"You and Lung reached a stalemate. At this point, a new cape appeared, and after one use of her power Lung retreated, screaming, and I quote your report 'like Dauntless after being awoken by a high voltage taser'."

"Yes, it was lucky he was available for verification."

Director Piggot wondered if the Simurgh was laughing at her somewhere. Or maybe she was loosing it. Hopefully it was simply an exceedingly powerful Master. She hadn't expect to ever think something like that. Not even the possibility of an elaborate prank was reassuring, if only because of the sheer scale. It would honestly be more worrying if a veteran hero lost it that badly without outside interference.

Well, she'd have to see this through to the bitter end.

"The power in question being the creation of bubbles. Soap bubbles."

"Yes, Ma'am"

At this point, she really wished for one of those stress balls. It wouldn't help, but it might stop her nails from digging into her pals quit so deeply.

"How? How would that work? Did she flood the street? Create bubbles in his lungs to choke him? Please explain this to me, your report was rather lacking. What kind of power are we talking here?"

Somewhere in the back of her mind, she was making a note to see a dentist. All this grinding couldn't be good for her teeth.

"According to her, she has the power to create up to thirty soap bubbles, no larger than 12.6 cm and no smaller than 1.8 cm and who's divergence of the ration of volume to surface from a perfect sphere may be no greater than 30%. These bubbles can be created from the palm of either hand, at velocities no greater than 1 m/s, measured in her frame of reference of the hand in question. They last for up to 23.4 seconds, but no less than 1.3 seconds. They do not leave any traces of soap behind after popping, but spectrographic analyses of the data points towards a mixture of common brands, namely-"

"Is her statement true?"

"No."

She smiled. Finally, the reason she slogged through all this, the thread she could pull on to unravel this whole thing.

And then he continued, and she felt a tiny bit of herself die.

"Measurements during a demonstration afterwards showed no evidence of bubbles larger than 12.5053 cm, with an error of 0.00006, as-"

"Spare me. Aside from measurement errors", she ground out, "she did not lie or show any evidence of some other power?"

"No, Ma'am."

She initiated the Master/Stranger protocols. If only so that everyone else would share her misery.

Emily Piggot just couldn't believe it.

"She walked away? We brought her in for questioning, and you let her leave?"

Armsmaster shrugged, rather more nonchalantly than she thought was appropriate.

"She pointed out that she had school today. It would be against regulation to deny a ward his state mandated education"

She just couldn't deal with him right now. She thought that rather often when it came to Armsmaster, but this time it was more than just a phrase. Her mind simply refused.

Luckily, there was someone else to ask, someone who was almost certainly uncompromised.

"Dragon, how could this happen? At the very least, the locks should have stopped her."

"It seems they had a so far undiscovered weakness to soap bubbles. I don't believe I can fix it, it seems to be shared by most of my technology. Luckily, only the specific kind produced by Bubble Girls power seem to be able to exploit this."

Emily Piggot floated in a zen-like state of serenity, until her brain managed to restart.

'Tagg, that guy deserves a promotion', she thought, 'Let's arrange one for him.'

[Some time later]

They were storming the PRT base. Coil's men had taken over in surprise attack, but there where still some cells of resistance, and if they could reach the central computer to reactivate the automatic defenses, they would be able to hold and retake the base. Sneaking through the dark corridors was a tense and dangerous affair, turncoats stalking the hallways for their loyal brothers.

Well, it might have been, if they didn't have super powers. Hell, even so Taylor would be able to take all of them down without a sweat. But she had an idea for an actual productive use for her power. At the next intersection, she leaned against the wall and send some bubbles forwards to catch sight of the other hallway in the reflection, to check for enemies. She already knew they where there, but that was besides the point.

It didn't work, the red emergency light was simply too low. Of course, the thugs spotted the bubbles and opened fire. A second later, the firing stopped; and dull thumps confirmed that ricochet could be a real problem in tight quarters like this. Of course, given the rather suspicious placement of the bullet holes, it was probably Sam's fault.

"The door is locked! This looks like a job for Bubble Girl!", Clockblocker exclaimed from where he was studying the next door. A door to which he had the access codes.

[A great deal later:]

Taylor smiled. It had been a long loop, but she'd finally found a use of her power. The great Scion-killing laser canon was charging up, ready to unleash it's mighty blast on one of her bubbles, where it would create something that could only be described as a Laser Shotgun.

And then she woke up in the Locker.

* * *

6.15 (BurnNote)

"Dad, I need your help."

Danny was both surprised and concerned (and, in a dark corner of his mind, gratified). They'd drifted apart after, well, after Annette. To see her coming to him with a problem was rare.

"What can I do for you, Taylor?"

"I need to sue for custody for my children."

Daniel Hebert was many things, but he wasn't prepared for that. Taylor took the chance to explain further.

"See, Eidolon is a terrible mother. He just kicked them out. I kind of adopted Sammy, and her brothers sort of followed. They can be a bit unruly, but they're good kids at heart. Well, core. But Eidolon is letting them run rampant and they need a firm but loving hand to keep them on the right track. Unfortunately, the mother normally has the advantage in settlements and I don't even have a claim beyond an informal adoption. And we're going to need a very generous settlement to support all three of them."

He took a deep breath. He was fairly sure this was not a joke, at least not by Taylor. That just wasn't her style. It might be some form of Master, you never knew with capes. And it could even be true, capes being capes.

Either way, his daughter needed help, his help, and he really had nothing to offer.

Except, on one night drinking together, Alan had mentioned something, a reclusive legend in his field. It might be a bit of work, but from the story, he should be able to find him fairly quickly.

"I think I know what to do. We need the Lawyer. This is exactly what he does."

Her honest smile made feel like a real father for the first time in a long while.

"Hey David, this just arrived at the New York headquarters. They asked me to deliver it to you as fast as possible", Legend called out after steping through the portal.

"Hmm, some court documents, probably supposed to stand witness in some cape crime again..."

He froze, his brows knitted in thought.

"What's the matter?"

Hopefully it wasn't another class action suit by captured villains for excessive bullshit. Those were always tiring, especially since he agreed on most points. Eidolon was kind of a cheater.

"He's been served the papers for the custody dispute."

Legend really hated it when Contessa snuck up on him like that. It'd been even worse when she'd been younger and gone through a pranking phase[1], but she till took every oppertunity to freak him out like that.

Contessa walked past Legend to pat Eidolon on the back.

"Don't worry, I'll represent you. Unless you're a horrible human being who kicked out his children, you won't be found guilty."

"Wait, you said you'd represent him? How could he possibly loose?"

"We're dealing with the Lawyer here. My power only works if there is a possibility of success. Trying to find something that doesn't exist just gives me a headache. On that note, where's my medicine?"

[1] Especially bad, since they couldn't even really punish her, she always claimed it was part of the Path to Victory, ensuring mental health in a growing child or something.

Legend had found a reasonable explanation for the sight before him: The Sleeper had awoken, this this was all-

"No, the Sleeper is still where he should be. I checked."

Dragon's face appeared on the screen before him. She looked as bewildered as he felt. This was something of an accomplishment.

The courtroom they were in was large, the largest ever been built (Dragon had taken a moment to inform him of this, rather smugly[2]). This was necessary, given some of the participants. It wasn't actually the first time someone tried to sue the, well the other side,[3] but it was certainly the first time they were suing anyone else. The human-sized witness stand looked rather lonely, but the Lawyer had insisted. He claimed it was traditional.

Though he had to admit, the Simurgh getting hugged by a teenage civilian and then receiving a pat on the head would lighten his darkest hours for the rest of his life.

The judge banged the gravel. He'd been doing that every now and then for a while, but Scion just wasn't the smartest. Just getting him to wear the robe and wig was an effort. They wouldn't have bothered if the Lawyer hadn't insisted, again claiming tradition. Maybe it was necessary for whatever power he had.

[2] More so than appropriate given the situation. Though granted, there wasn't really anything appropriate about the whole thing.

[3]Though no one had been suicidal enough to try and serve the papers, as far as he knew. There wouldn't be much left of anyone who tried, anyway.

[Several dramatic acts of courtroom drama]

"Objection! While my client may have been used in committing the crimes he is accused of, he isn't the true murderer. No, that would be the one responsible for giving powers to humans, who's evil plan of genocide my client has been working against since before the day he got his powers."

There was gasp and murmuring in the courtroom[4], while Contessa dramatically pointed.

"I accuse the so called Greatest Hero, Scion, of murder."

[4] Another feature the Lawyer had insisted upon. Even if the trial was closed to the public[5], dramatic reactions from the crowd were apparently a must. Dragon, who had a secret love of drama, didn't mind too much.

[5] Officially, it was to protect the plaintiffs, put no one was sure what a bunch of Endbringers would need to be protected from, and anyone who willingly hung around them got what was coming for them.

[Later, in Los Angeles, Japan]

"I wish to be emancipated."

The Lawyer looked up at the enormous metal dragon squeezed into his office.

Well, after the last case, something nice and simple to fill his time would be just the thing,

"Do you have any suspects for the murderer?"

* * *

A/N: And I'm finally done compiling all of the loops that have been posted so far. If you didn't see the youtube link on the previous page, go back now, because I've updated it.


	7. Chapter 7

7.1 (NoSolution)

"This session will now come to order." Accord banged his gavel on the table. It was a fairly nondescript room. White walls, white ceiling and a white floor. There were no windows in the room, nor were there any doors. The wooden table was rectangular, surrounded by plush chairs one would expect of a meeting. All in all, the room was what one would expect to see in a hospital, or more like the meeting room of a secret society due to the lack of entrances and exits. The meeting place was indeed the hub for a secret society. Occupying multiple seats around the table were costumed individuals at the head of one side of the table was Accord, I was facing him, on the other head of the table.

"Roll call will now begin, if you do not reply you will be noted as absent and will subsequently be cut from any operations during this Loop. Accord? Present. Citrine?"

"Present."

"Doctor Mother?"

"Present."

"Contessa?"

"Present."

"Doormaker? ... Absent. Clairvoyant? … Absent."

"Tattletale?"

"Conspicuously absent" was the reply.

"Very well, Tattletale is absent and will not be voting. Grue?"

"Here."

"Bitch?"

"Yeah."

"Regent?"

"Sup?"

"Imp?"

"Yo."

"Lung?"

"Yes."

"Dragon?"

"Present."

"Armsmaster? Miss Militia? Battery? Assault? Clockblocker? Vista? Kid Win? Triumph? Aegis? All absent. Skitter?"

"Here."

"Very well, we have 11 loopers attending, as such for any operations to begin we require 6 loopers to approve. Now, to review our operations in the last 5 loops, we unleashed an Evil!Dragon and fought her, we created a musical, "The World and its Capes", revived Eden, had a visit from a group named ARCON and made Shadow Stalker become the World's Most Wanted. Notable divergences of this loop are Saint does not exist as well as Imp is now awake. Welcome Imp. Now are there any suggestions for loop QA5?"

"How about we look at the checklist of fun stuff to do?" Imp proposed.

"How about we review the challenges we have previously suggested?" Tattletale said.

"Very well, challenges suggested but not completed are as follows, create a world war of US vs them, make a Slaughterhouse 9000 consisting of 9000 different individuals, find a peaceful wildlife in Australia, convince everyone shards are really magic, create a time-travel device and persuade Accord it's Imp's first time looping... Who's Imp?"

* * *

7.2 (ecs05norway)

I'll admit right now that I wasn't really sure I wanted to go through with this. I'd Awoken this loop a few days after the Locker Incident, at home on a break the doctors had insisted on before going back to school. It was a crazy idea. Everyone was going to think I'd gone crazy. But then, I'd been looping for... how many centuries, at this point? I wasn't quite sure. Lisa might know.

It would take some work. And some careful preparation. A visit to a music shop a few dozen loops ago had provided me a duplicate of my mother's flute, that I'd spent three loops learning to play. It was tucked away in my subspace pocket, now, safe enough until I was ready to put it to use. Either I was going to drive Sophia completely and utterly insane, or I'd... well, it didn't really matter. It might make this loop slightly more interesting, however.

Monday dawned clear and warm, a beautiful sunny day that promised a gorgeous afternoon. Perfect for my plans. I slung my backpack over one shoulder, and jogged off to school with a song in my heart.

Okay, so it was the Masochism Tango. When it comes to sheer sociopathy, nothing beats Tim Lehrer.

Besides, it was entirely appropriate for what I was about to do.

The Terrible Trio were gathered near the entrance to the school, of course, awaiting my arrival. I'd sent some bugs ahead to verify this, just to get my timing exactly perfect. They didn't waste time spotting me, and as I got closer I could already hear them.

"There she is, back from the looney bin," taunted Madison.

"Stupid bitch should've stayed there," Sophia added.

"Hey, hey! It's great to see you guys! I missed you so much!" That one was me, throwing my arms around Emma for a nice big best-friends hug. She spluttered, confused, and tried to push me away, but I didn't let go until I was good and ready to.

Then I turned to Madison, giving her the same treatment. "Mads! You're looking good this week. Had a nice weekend?"

"..." She stared at me, mouth working for a moment, then snarled out "What is your -damage-, Hebert?"

I grinned and turned to Sophia, starting to slide my arms around her in turn, but she ducked away with a graceful little martial-arts dodge. Probably the result of all her training with the Wards. It was ok, I had had some of the same training. Hundreds of times over. I just stepped into it and caught her before she could duck away, pulling her close with a grin. "Oh, it's simple, Maddie," I answered. Then I turned and looked Sophia in the eyes. "I've decided I'm not going to put up with this anymore. Emma -is- my best friend, she has been since we were little, and I'm not going to let you two come between us. So if you're her friends, you're my friends too."

The look in Sophia's eyes might have been something approaching interest. Or maybe murderous rage. I was having too much fun to try to figure out the difference right a that moment.

"Anyway," I said, ignoring her attempts to say something, "It's great to see you guys again, but I've got some paperwork to take care of before classes start, so I'll see you there, okay? Maybe we can do lunch up on the roof or something, just us."

That -definitely- got Sophia's interest. Heh. She was expecting an opportunity... well, she was going to get one.

It was an uneventful morning. The Trio either had had nothing planned, waiting to see what condition I'd return in before acting... or had been thrown off by my ebullient greeting and were still trying to figure out what had gone wrong. I turned in the homework I'd completed while on enforced rest, collected new assignments, and enjoyed watching the anticipation build.

Lunch hour found me seated on the roof, a pillow set beneath me to protect my body (and my jeans) from the asphalt and gravel of the roofing material. Matching pillows were set out nearby, in colors that seemed (to my own twisted mind, at least) to match those of my tormentors - black for Sophia, red for Emma, and gold for Madison.

I was working my way through a hauntingly lively tarantella on the flute when they finally arrived.

"What the -fuck-, Hebert?" Ahh, Sophia, such eloquence. I shall have to teach you the value of rhetoric, someday.

I drew the verse to a close, lowering the gleaming silver flute, and took the time to clean it briefly before tucking it back in its case. "And hello to you as well, Sophia." I took a moment to let the bugs I'd brought with me get into position. "Please, be seated. We really do need to talk."

Madison, at least, seemed inclined to humor me for the moment, settling into position on the gold cushion with ease. "What did you want to talk about, Taylor?" she asked.

"I hope it isn't going to be more whining about how you just want us to leave you alone," Emma said, taking her own seat.

"No, no. I got a better idea," Sophia said. "You want us to leave you alone, be your friend, all that crap? You want something from me, you gotta -take- it." She didn't sit. She just gave me a 'come and get it' with one hand, her feet sliding into position in a familiar stance.

I came and got it.

Let it not be said that I am unfamiliar with the ways of hand to hand combat. I -prefer- my swarm, but I'm not bound to it. Not anymore. If nothing else, I've had enough runs through Nerima loops that I learned for sheer survival's sake.

If I'd wanted to show my full skill, I could've had Sophia on her knees begging for mercy in seconds. If that was what I wanted. I thought about it, for a moment, watching her there. But I'd had my chances at revenge. I'd had loops where I'd gone 'Carrie' on her, where I'd thrown my swarm in her face and -dared- her to come after me again. It got boring a long, long time ago.

The short version is, I threw the fight.

The not quite so short version is, I tried to make doing so look good, for both of us. Which I may have overestimated her skill level a bit. My fault, I'd last fought her in a Nerima loop where she'd been training with the Amazons, and I expected her to know a few of their tricks. So I ended up having to give her a lucky break, rolling my foot on a bit of gravel and letting her get in a leg-sweep to put me on my back.

I opened my eyes to see her smiling down at me, white teeth gleaming in her bronzed face.

"So, bug-girl's got some spirit, huh?"

No, I don't know how her hand got inside my shirt. Or why she seemed so pleased about it. It would explain a -lot- about her and Emma, though.

* * *

7.3 (aquinas)

A week ago, the Simurgh mentions that she thinks the carpet in the Undersider's hideout is lovely.

Two days ago, she smiles at a little boy, he trips on a loose brick and skins his knee.

Alec drinks the last of the milk.

A walnut falls in the middle of the sidewalk five minutes early.

Taylor opens the fridge.

Kenta trips, dropping a handful of change.

"Sam, can I trust you to get us some milk."

The grocery store is shoddy and smells like mildew and rotten dishwater. It is an interesting smell. On the back wall, is a case of dairy products. She walks to it slowly past the dog food, her heart speeds up.

He is there, they reach for the door and their fingers touch.

"Excuse me."

Grabs a gallon of skim from under his arm and saunters - she believes she saunters - away, through baked goods.

When time comes to pay, she is in line behind him ready with a missing dime.

The next Tuesday Kenta is already eight feet tall - eyes smoldering red - in an uncomfortably small booth. There is a fight here, somehow, building inside of him, but he cannot find it staring over his fries at a hundred pound girl.

She was sipping a strawberry milkshake with a puzzled expression on her face.

"Kenta?"

"Yes... Sam."

"What do you do?"

She touched a finger to her chin, catching a drop of whipped cream on her finger tip. She watched it slide over her nail, then licked it off.

"I manage a warehouse near the docks."

He took a bite out of his cheeseburger.

"Is it dangerous."

"Very"

The Simurgh reached out, and pulled a fry off Kenta's plate. Kenta glowered.

She looked at it and dipped it in her milkshake.

She took a bite

"Hmm." she smiled.

The Undersider's had gathered around the TV when she got back.

"Hey Sam, how was your date?" Grue asked.

"Good, we are going out again Friday."

On the television, a fire was burning.

* * *

7.4 (Prim-the-Amazing)

"Alas, my dear Clockblocker, our love can never be, for I am a slave to my inner sinful desires, a villain, and you are a servant of justice, a hero. Star-crossed lovers, we are, ripped apart from each other's loving arms by fate, O that cruel bitch. My eternal and everlasting love which burns with the fireist of fires, the one called passion, Skitter." Dennis finally finished the four page long love sonnet sent by Brockton Bay's number one creepiest villain.

Silence.

"And… you're sure the letter was sent by her?" Dean asked.

"The damn thing was delivered by a swarm of butterflies, Dean." Dennis replied snappily, although his eyes looked vague and terribly confused. And a little bit terrified as well.

"Fireist isn't actually a word." Chris pointed out.

"Bit off topic, Kid Win." Browbeat said.

"Yes, because what is on topic is that the most terrifying villain in the world is apparently sending me love fucking sonnets!"

"Now, I wouldn't go so far as to say that she's the most terrifying villain in the world-"

"I don't care what the world thinks, she shoved bugs into my nose and ears and mouth, Chris!"

"At least she held back from penetrating any other holes on your person…?"

"That's… that's not helping, Chris."

"Whatever happened to just, Sincerely, Fill in name?" Dean desperately derailed the discussion.

"Whatever happened to sanity?" Dennis replied and sagged into his seat, dramatically throwing an arm over his eyes.

Taylor snickered at what her bugs were showing her. Dennis was her favorite person to prank. His reactions were always so funny!

Step one in my grand plan to make Clockblocker my unwilling star-crossed lover: check

Next step: serenade him

Later:

The nightmarish swarm of bugs shaped into the form of a woman that was somehow wearing a red ball gown vibrated its thousand wings just so so that it almost sounded as if it had just gasped in horror. He hadn't seen when it had arrived.

"Clockblocker, how could you!?"

Dennis looked next to him to Taylor, the girl he had just rescued from a car crash by freezing the car. She was clutching at his arm, glaring at Skitter's avatar. Dennis rubbed at the bright red lipstick marks on the cheek of his mask. He'd never saved such a grateful girl before.

"Oh, and who's this pathetic little bug?" Taylor said cattily with a raised eyebrow.

"I really don't think you should insult a Parahuman, miss-" Dennis tried.

"What did you just call me!?" Skitter interrupted with a simulated screech of rage.

"You heard me, bitch!" Taylor let go of his arm and took a step towards Skitter. Skitter took another step towards Taylor in turn, until the two of them almost touching noses.

"Oh my god, there's two of them." Dennis realized. Two stalkers.

"How dare you!? He is mine, you little cow!" Skitter hissed.

"Excuse me!?"

They were making a scene. People were beginning to stare. Never before had Clockblocker felt embarrassed to be in the spotlight. He reached out, perhaps to calm them, perhaps to freeze them, but then... but then Skitter pulled Taylor's hair. Somehow. Taylor shrieked and clawed at Skitter's fake eyes, at which Skitter acted like she was hurt for some reason. Skitter tackled Taylor to the ground and Taylor pulled at Skitters ball gown, which snapped at one of the straps. As she was made of bugs, it wasn't really sexy.

Step 212 in my Clockblocker star-crossed lover plan: create a love triangle between Skitter, Clockblocker, and my civilian identity for additional drama by way of cat fight. Check

Step 213: Introduce a long lost brother into the equation for MORE drama. ALL THE DRAMA!

* * *

7.5 (nocarename)

Generally, I ditched school as soon as I Awoke. Not worth the prodding and snipping.

Once in a while, Emma found something that hadn't grown scabs emotional to pick at and that ended poorly. Or explosively, but that just headed toward investigations and more Protectorate heroes.

But I was engaged in Science at Winslow this time. The cameras I'd put in place over the weekend kept it from being screwing around - they recorded the effects of the exotic bomb I'd picked up from Bakuda's workshop a few loops back.

When most of the students were in the timer I'd set ran down. Once the bright light cleared, everything was different.

Madison was a dewy eyed kitten.

Emma had come out as a floppy eared puppy.

I was a duckling. (An ugly one. And not a swan either. The feather pattern was fairly distinctive.)

Everyone at Winslow was, in fact, now a baby animal. Even with time looping in knots Tinkers were totally bullshit.

"I am the night!"

Sophia had turned into a bat.

"I am vengeance!"

A small one. If there had been any humans left in Winslow she might have been as long as someone's thumb.

"You're adorable," said a small bird. I think it was one of the less popular boys - George, Greg, something like that.

She flew at him and started flapping at him harmlessly.

I started pecking at the controls for an older cellphone. That footage was going straight to YouTube.

* * *

7.6 (Zulaq)

Lady Photon looked at the teenaged girl on the other side of her desk, curiosity in her gaze. "Tell me Taylor, why do you want to join New Wave, when you can so easily go to the PRT and join the Wards?"

The tall, lanky girl nervously adjusted her glasses, "Well, it's kinda like this. When I first got my powers, I experimented with them a bit, you know, just to get an idea of what I can do. Well, I had the bright idea of using my powers to find out more about the three girls who caused me to trigger. And well… I found out one of them is a cape."

Lady Photon held up a hand to stop Taylor. "You used your power to find out the identity of another cape? I understand how localized omniscience can lead to discovering that sort of thing, but you must keep that information to yourself. There are certain, unspoken, rules to being a parahuman, and secret identities, for those who have them, are sacrosanct."

Taylor blushed. "I know that now, but at the time I just wanted to know what drove them to do what they did. I didn't want to learn Shadow Stalker's identity, it just happened." She sighed, "After I learned that, I decided that there was no way in hell I'd ever join the Wards while she was a member."

Lady Photon made to interrupt again, but Taylor held up a hand, indicating she wasn't done. "Getting back to your original question. I want to be a hero, and the only way I could do that with my power is by joining a team. But any team which lets somebody like Shadow Stalker join, and not hold her accountable for her behavior, is not one I'd want to join."

"So you came to me, and my team."

"Yes, I came to you. New Wave is the one hero organization in town which I know for sure aren't a bunch of hypocrites. You hold yourselves to a higher standard. There's no way you'd let some petty bully join you, and no way to hide it if you did." Taylor hesitated a moment, "I might be a bit leery of having my identity public, but the way I see it, it's a small price to pay in order to join a team which definitely doesn't have someone as crazy as Sophia."

Taylor had a smile on her face as she left Lady Photon 'call me Sarah's office. It wasn't the first time she'd joined New Wave, but it was the first time she'd tried doing so deliberately hiding the majority of her baseline powers. Pretending only to have extrasensory perception of the area around her was easy using her bugs, but remembering to not actively use the bugs was the hard part.

Knowing exactly what sort of story to feed Lady Photon helped as well. Sarah was really big on the whole superhero accountability after all, so telling her that she wanted to join just for that was pretty much guaranteed to get her in. And Taylor knew she won't have any trouble fitting in with their fighting style, after all, for all their raw power, New Wave really lacked somebody who could help direct them and provide situational control, which was what her pretend powers were perfect for.

Now she just had to wait as the other three parts of her plan moved into place.

Taylor sighed to herself. Loops where she went full in with New Wave always did have their ups and downs, and nowhere was that more apparent than when she was at school. Whispers had followed her from the moment she arrived. Other students would stop and stare as she walked down the corridors, almost disbelieving that their least popular classmate had publicly declared herself a hero, even if her powers left a bit to be desired.

It was a bit satisfying to have the people who stood by while she was being bullied suddenly have their preconceptions about her shattered. But, at the same time, Taylor knew that the only thing that made them think was the fact she had superpowers, and that depressed her. Suddenly having classmates come up and try to be friends, or want to discuss the latest cape news, or want to get an introduction to Glory Girl, all of it was so fucking superficial, she wanted to scream.

Taylor smiled softly; fortunately, she already had a plan in motion to make things interesting.

Taylor was waiting outside of Lady Photon's office when Amy and Victoria arrived to Victoria's surprise. "How'd you get here before us? We flew directly from school!"

Taylor shrugged, "Winslow gets out half an hour earlier than Arcadia."

"Oh," Victoria sighed, wondering why Taylor kept insisting on studying at Winslow, Victoria's Aunt Sarah had already offered, several times, to expedite a transfer to Arcadia, but Taylor kept declining with a small smile on her face. It was that more than anything which creeped Victoria out the most about Taylor. No matter what she always had a small smile on her face, like she knew something that you didn't.

Amy just stood silently, playing with her hair.

"Any idea why Aunt Sarah wants to meet with us?" Victoria asked, not wanting to wait in silence.

"Dunno," Taylor shrugged again, her small smile still on her face, "I could make some guesses, or use my power, but what's the fun in that?"

Victoria didn't know how to respond to that. Taylor could easily find out what's going on, she always could, that was her power after all, but she didn't quite seem to get that everybody else couldn't. But what worried Victoria the most was how Taylor always seemed constantly bemused, as if she got something which everybody else didn't have clue about.

But before Victoria could ask again, the door to her aunt's office opened and her aunt asked them to enter.

Upon entering the office, they found that Lady Photon was standing with two masked robed figures, one about a head shorter than the other, but otherwise identical.

Before Victoria could ask, Lady Photon already started introductions. "Victoria, Amy, Taylor, I'd like you to meet Millipede and Centipede, the newest members of the Wards and Protectorate respectively. Milli, Centi, it's my pleasure to introduce my nieces Panacea and Glory Girl, along with Farseer."

The two robed figures bowed, "It is a pleasure to meet you." Something about her voice set Victoria on edge, it sounded off, like she was speaking through an echo chamber or something.

Victoria smiled, "It's always good to meet new heroes! I'm sure we'll get along great." Beside her, Amy nodded shyly, while Taylor still had her small smile, and was that a twinkle in her eye, but nodded as well.

"It is good to know that there are other heroines around my daughters age, I'm sure she will appreciate having someone she can talk to who won't be, surprised, by her appearance." The shorter of the two seemed to shrink a little at the taller's words.

Victoria smiled, "I'm sure we'll get along great." Then the daughter comment registered, "Oh you're a second generation cape too! That's great, there aren't that many outside of my family and it'll be great to have someone to share experiences with."

Millipede seemed to shrink back even more, before replying, almost too quietly for Victoria to hear, "Third generation,"

Victoria frowned, "Third generation? But aren't you kind of old for that?"

Centipede was the one to reply, "We don't actually know our exact ages, we're what the PRT calls Case 53s. One day we just woke up, my daughter, my father and I, not knowing anything other than our relationships to each other."

To Victoria's surprise, Amy was the one to respond, "Is that why you wear those cloaks?" What was she talking about? Why would that explain why they wore full cloaks. Victoria tried to recall what she knew about Case 53 capes. They were those capes who were found with no memory, a tattoo somewhere on their body and a generally some form of disfigurement. Oh.

Millipede seemed to back away even further, but her mother put a hand on her shoulder. "Don't worry Milli, these are heroes, I'm sure that they won't mind." She turned to Amy, "Yes, we wear these cloaks because our appearance tends to be a bit, discomforting, for most people. You see, our bodies are almost entirely made up of our namesakes."

Victoria tried picturing that in her head, and almost lost her lunch. Suddenly she was very thankful that the pair were wearing such concealing clothing.

Lady Photon, seemingly seeing where her niece's thoughts were going intervened, "I'm sure that the five of you will get plenty of chances to know each other. We're actually here to discuss another matter. You see-"

Centipede held up a hand, "Thank you Sarah, but I believe I should be the one to explain." She turned to face the three teens, and even though Victoria couldn't see it through her mask, she was certain that she was looking directly at them.

With eyes made of centipedes… Eww…

Victoria shook her head, and tried to erase that image, while Centipede was still speaking," –You see, my father, Decipede, unlike my daughter and myself, has not decided to become a hero, and is instead taking a more villainous roll in this city. If you encounter him, you must call for back up immediately, as he has the power to control all the insects in his area."

Victoria barely repressed a snort, no insects were going to get past her invulnerability.

Lady Photon frowned at Victoria, a we will talk later look on her face, but did not interrupt Centipede.

"While we are not currently sure where he is, he is a devious person, and totally without scruples. You must not underestimate him, as he has a habit of pulling out wins where he really shouldn't be able to."

Victoria rolled her eyes. "Yeah sure, we can take him."

Taylor slapped her.


	8. Chapter 8

AN: In a bit (could be a few hours, could be a few weeks), I'll be reuploading some of the earlier chapters, to remove a select few loops that aren't canon, and also to upload some new loops to 1.11 (where the Simurgh is an Undersider)

8.1 (Rex)

I recovered the phone with a muffled curse, its sudden massive size in my hands now recognizable as a lack of technological advancements rather than misfiring neurons in my sleep addled brain.

It is not because I was really freaking small before I got my growth spurt or anything like that. Really, I was perfectly proportional for my age. Which was currently six years old, as Lisa was enthusiastically informing me in her uninterrupted rant.

"Got to deal with my goddamn parents when I had managed to mostly get over all the issues they gave me the first time. And for a fun bonus, I still have my powers! So hello exploitation train! Come rolling right on in, because this time they aren't even going to wait until-" She cut herself off with a sharp gasp. I could guess why.

It was the same thing that I had realized the very first time I had woken up as a child. Admittedly, it hadn't been this young, but five years had been more than enough time to stop the accident.

"Rex." Lisa breathed out. Trying to control herself. It had been a very long time since I had last heard Tattletale mention her brother, but I still remembered his nickname. "He's alive, Taylor. I can save him! This will change…" She trailed off, overwhelmed at the possibilities. Sadly, I had to cut a few of them off.

"Lisa," I said softly, gently. She wasn't going to like what I was going to say. "No. He's not really."

"He is. I mean, it's just for the loop but he's still breathing and thinking right now so he's alive again and I can maybe see what he'd be like as a grown up." I breathed out. She hadn't fallen into the same trap I had.

"Yeah, it's more like… a visit from an old friend than a revival." I was glad Lisa had accepted that so easily, when Mom hadn't been there when the next loop started, It had sent me into a depressive spiral deeper then one I had been in when I first became Skitter. But her power didn't work on the mechanics of loops so, "How?"

"Did I know it wouldn't carry over?" Lisa completed my question. "You weren't really that surprised about us being younger then normal. Implies this has happened to you before. In most loops, you don't have a mother. Implies that you either couldn't or deliberately chose not to save her. Your relationship with your father and the way you talk about your mother is way to positive for things to have turned out worse between them if she survived. Therefore changes we make to the timeline here will have no effect on the future. Same as all the other loops. We just have more options than normal." Lisa chuckled to herself. "Come on, I didn't even need to have my powers to work that one out." I noticed that she didn't say she hadn't used them, but I didn't bring it up.

"You mentioned options. Got anything in mind?" I redirected the conversation to the single most important question any loopers could conceive.

What are we going to do to entertain ourselves?

"Not sure yet, either go whole hog and make as many ripples as possible, or set up some sort of long con for massive payout. But first things first, did you know that my family apparently owns a house in Brockton Bay?"

"I did not. It's honestly managed to never come up. You moving in?" My cheeks were beginning to hurt from the size of my smile. Me and Lisa loose in Brockton in the 00's? I hadn't done that before!

"Give me a week or two. And then I'm thinking Marquis acquires a pair of new minions that get all sorts of rumors flying around. I wanna see what sort of shit Panacea gets up to without Glory hole fucking things up."

"Sounds good to me. Now if you will excuse me, it's waffle day and intend to give my mother a very large hug to celebrate this fact." I waited for Lisa's goodbye before dropping the phone and bounding out of my room and down the stairs with every scrap of energy my six year old body could muster. Just because they were only visiting, didn't mean it wasn't nice to see your old friends and family.

8.2 (Prim-the-Amazing)

His orders given, Lung turned around and began walking. Time to waste some fuckers.

"Hold it right there!" A young female voice rang out behind him, and Lung restrained a sigh. Probably some overconfident rookie cape again. Why did they always get into fights with him? Was it his face? His accent? The way he referred to all of his enemies as children? Nah.

He turned around.

The girl's costume was… girly. Very… very pink. And frilly. Dear god, the frills. He'd never seen so much lace in one place at a time before in his life either.

"Who the fuck are you, bitch?" He asked, just to get the introductions out of the way. The rookies always dramatically shouted their name anyway.

She did not disappoint.

One hand on her hip, the other pointing straight upwards at the sky, she shot him a determined look.

"My name is Princess Ladybug, Brockton Bay's very own magical girl, here to fight for justice, freedom, peace, and the AMERICAN WAY!"

Ah. So she was one of those. The capes that insisted that powers were magic. Ugh. This was downright painful to listen too. And watch. The sooner Lung got this over with, the better. Princess Ladybug, huh? Some kind of bug power then, probably. Feh. He'd never heard of a weaker sounding power in his life. This would be easy.

Scales bursting forth from his skin, Lung, heh, lunged. (Get it!?)

And that was the day that Lung was beaten up by pretty little butterflies.

8.3 (The_One_Butcher)

This time around Taylor made her début under the name "Princess" and showed off none of her control powers, just supernatural martial arts and style. Posing as a proud warrior she challenged Lung to a honour duel and made a wager. Lung was a man of his word, so a good while later when it came time to cash in on it he was broken out of the Birdcage and stuffed into a snazzy tuxedo that still showed off his pecs. It was one of Rarity's, especially made for a draconic gentleman. By controlling him for microseconds at a time she kept his power active.

Rarity did impeccable work, the tux fit perfectly the whole time and not even Armsmaster's nanothorns could cut it.

And Lung was scary on a visceral "I am going to be eaten." Level that no amount of Nightmare bugs or pet Endbringers could match. (Mostly because Endbringers were overkill in that her brain just shut down for a few seconds in which she can gather some of her composure.) Nothing could give Emma a more horrified look. She was honestly jealous of him sometimes.

It was the most awesome prom ever.

8.4 (The_One_Butcher)

"Twilight!" Taylor grinningly greeted her favourite fuzzy purple pointy amazing Anchor. "I have a wonderful present for you! A completely new theory of literature! It challenges all assumptions made by human or humanlike storytellers. It is a coherent and completely new and alien way of storytelling that teaches how to write amazing novels completely free of conflict!"

"Oh, really? And it works? Who created it?" Twilight asked.

"Dragon."

8.5 (rick1497)

Sam exited her pod in full costume. She also made sure that her current body looked banged up due to the nature of her "journey."

"People of Brockton Bay, My name is Delphi and I come from the future," She began, "could someone please tell me the date so I know if I have arrived at the right time?"

While the surprise was starting to wear off, and the reporters were arriving, someone finally answered her with "It's January Seventh."

"Oh dear, I seem to have gone back a bit further than I intended. I did not mean to arrive until late early April after my mother joins the wards. Now I arrive less than a week after she has triggered."

At this time one of the reporters approached her and began to ask questions. "Excuse me, but did you say you were from the future?"

"Yes, three decades from now."

"But how did you come back, is that your power?"

"No, I'm have precognitive powers. I knew a tinker that specialized in the time stream."

"But if he could do that, why didn't he send himself back?"

"He could only send one person back, and only a precog can track the changes that are made to the time stream. My mission is too important to leave to somebody who can't adjust for a changing time stream."

"What mission?"

"I can't give you any specifics at this time, but I have to prevent a series of disasters from coming. Unfortunately, I arrived months ahead of schedule and I can't act without changing the time stream. As such, I will spend the next couple of months living with my mom. Bye."

Despite desperate attempts by the reporters, she didn't give out any more information, and somehow managed to lose them.

Danny Hebert watched the news with worry, his daughter mirroring his expression. Assuming that this woman was telling the truth, and she really was from the future, than that meant that there was a series of disasters on the way for his city. That meant that he should take Taylor and leave as soon as possible. Still, this Delphi mentioned that she didn't intend to arrive until April, so they had some time. Still, he had to leave town early, the news stations had been repeating it enough that everyone in the city knew about it. Come late March, the streets would be packed with people fleeing.

"Hi mom, grandpa." Came a voice behind him.

It was the woman from the news, the one that traveled back in time.

8.6 (Guardian Box) or Miss Hebert Goes On A Vacation

She considered this loop. Frankly, the thought of even entertaining the thought of enjoying the subtle pleasures of the Trio's company made her sick. The very idea of, once again, fighting, trying to clean up the Bay, or doing anything at all really, filled her with disgust. So she made her decision.

"Fuck it, I'm going on a vacation"

And so she did.

-=B=-

First, she needed a car to quickly get away from this mess of a city. She ventured into one of the more up-scale neighbourhoods and found a suitable vehicle. It was quite a nice ride, and considering all that happened to her thorough all of her lives, she quickly decided she quite deserved to travel in style. Employing all of her considerable experience, painstakingly acquired thorough uncountable aeons, she checked for the security, blocked off cameras, broke into the car, hot-wired it and rode away, happily and quite deliberately ignorant of the world around her.

-=B=-

Max Anders scratched his head in befuddlement. He could have sworn he parked his automobile, imported from Germany at no small expense, right where the empty spot on the parking lot was. Suspecting a theft, he promised himself to have words with the security responsible for this place later. Still, he had work to do, and no way to get to his workplace. He dialled for one of his employees who owned him a favour to come and pick him up.

Minutes later, a nice but not as nice car arrived, and good old Frank stepped out and opened the door for him. Max got in, readying himself for a day of hard work as a CEO of a successful medical company, ignoring Frank's incessant blabber about his 'psycho wife'.

What Max didn't know is that Frank's wife recently learned that her husband was cheating on her with a younger woman. When the car bomb went off, neither knew what hit them.

-=B=-

Taylor knew how to drive. Say otherwise to her face and you'll get a face full of spiders.

So when she swerved off to avoid a kitten on the road, driven through a side walk and hit an unsuspecting older Asian guy, it was totally his fault. An unfortunate accident by no means caused by Taylor forgetting which pedal did what.

And unless you have some weird fetish for spiders invading your every orifice, you better believe that's exactly what happened.

-=B=-

When the police and paramedics arrived, they were unable to help the older gentleman. It was pronounced that he died instantly, and a warrant for the car that hit him was put up. Later in the morgue, the identification process for the man began. Unfortunately, one Mr. Kenta didn't have any listed family left to contact.

-=B=-

She stopped at a gas station. She had a long way before her after all, not that she knew where she was going, and needed her tank full for the trip.

Still fuming from the earlier accident, which was by no means her fault, she was lost in thought enough not to notice her tank overflowing and gas starting to leak on the pavement. Upon finally spotting the leakage, and realising she had no money to pay for it anyway, she calmly went into the car and drove the fuck away before anyone could stop her.

The ancient and faulty dispenser kept happily spewing forth flammable substances.

-=B=-

Thomas didn't get much sleep last night, so it could be forgiven of him to forget to do a thing or two in the early morning.

Still, he went on with his routine admirably, getting up, cleaning himself, eating breakfast and driving to work, all the while having a nagging feeling he forgot something. Of course, as luck would have it, his car was all out of fuel, so he drove to a nearby gas station to fill up his tank. Just as he drove in, he saw a car speeding out. Thinking nothing of it he got out of his car, ready to refuel, when he noticed the smell of spilled gasoline and a youngster on a bike who didn't quite take the "no smoking" sign seriously. He could only watch in fascinated horror as the still smouldering remnant of a thrown out smoke sailed through the air, straight for the puddle of spilled gasoline.

'Ah, that' he suddenly remembered, as the flickering ember ignited the spilled fuel, 'forgot to split the timeline', he thought half a second before the gas station exploded.

8.7 (Rex)

I was smiling. Fortunately, my mask was full facial, so none of my jailers could tell. Well, not jailers exactly. I Had gone to some trouble in order to make sure they brought me here. Though really, with my reputation I doubt they would have tried to keep me away even if I was still a villainous warlord rather than a probationary ward.

"Jitterbug, it's time." Chevalier's rich voice was as calm as ever. I had once devoted 50 straight loops to trying to make him squeak in fear. I hadn't succeeded. Yet.

I opened my mouth and began to sing.

"Four and a half billion years of peaceful existence,

Before they came along just to end it.

So the tri-annual problem for our generation

Is finding a way to defend it."

Behemoth, first and least terrible of the Endbringers obligingly tore his way out of the ground at just the right time for me to transition into the second verse. Pretending to be a song based trump became so much easier with Ziz on my side. I encouraged the defending humans to start their attacks with the second verse.

"Like maybe...

Building a rocket

Or sending a mecha

Or setting up a giant blockade."

All of which were useless against the Herokiller of course, but it's the thought that counts. And besides the two extras for this loop were the ultimate trump card, so even for a Jitterbug loop I was being extra silly this time around. Speaking of which,

"Utilizing someone that doesn't exist." I gestured at my former teammates, drawing a butterfly arrow over the youngest team member's head prompting her to give a token 'hey' in protest to being singled out like that.

"or giving a villain your aid." Entirely a space filler, and inappropriate for this early in the combat. I just couldn't come up with something better for this specific situation, so the line from when I arrive much later on snuck its way through.

"Stopping lightning bolts" Go go golem power. Oh, and Alexandria blocked one too, but if she would go ahead and fuck off already that would be great.

I may still be bitter about all the times she killed me when I tried to stage a brutal take over of Cauldron using only capes under the age of ten.

"Creating nanobots" Which were pretty much completely useless against Behemoth considering how fast those things burnt up, but the Azazel made a decent attempt at it anyway. People were always so willing to trust thinkers once they were on the same side. I'd be annoyed if it didn't tend to be so very useful.

"Or locating Clockblocker's brain." I continued to sing. I couldn't let my cynicism get in the way of the tempo. If this didn't work out, then the deal was that I would land straight back in prison, this time without the PRT's favor. I ignored Clockblocker's squawking about how he was right there, instead choosing to pause for a brief interlude. I hummed under my breath for a moment to stop anyone from being suspuscious. Behemoth was battering away at a massively fortified wall that had sprung out of nowhere to separate him from the rest of New Delphi. The next verse was done all in a rush, the last of the high energy listing before I switched to the new verses I had prepared.

"Finding a helpful plan

Protecting a city

and driving Tattletale insane"

Tattletale called out my cape name in annoyance. I didn't bother hiding how much that made my smile grow. When she wasn't in the loop my apparent ability to succeed in any task so long as I sang about it gave her power fits as it tried to work out the mechanics behind it.

"As you can hear

There's a whole lot of stuff to do

Before he breaks that wall"

A bird themed cape in blue and gold power armor was sent flying backwards from a swing of the endbringer's mighty fist. Despite being torn in half, the obvious tinker showed no signs of difficulty. I doubt anyone else heard the pilot of the top half call down to the legs.

"Come on Ferb!" And there was my pair of ace in the holes. Fused loops with the most overpowered reality warpers I had ever encountered short of the gods and goddess of Yggdrasil themselves. Neither of them seemed to be awake, but it was notoriously hard to tell the difference with these two. I reached the final, triumphant verse.

"So laze around 'cause Phineas and Ferb

Are gonna do it all

So laze around 'cause Phineas and Ferb are

Gonna do it all!"

My task completed and the destruction of Behemoth ensured. (again.) I pulled up a convenient lounge chair, stripped out of my costume, and began working on my tan. My relaxtion was interrupted by Armsmaster's complaint to his not yet girlfriend.

"Dragon! Jitterbug's neglecting her duties against an Endbringer!" It was amazing how much of a stick up his ass Armsmaster managed to maintain if he wasn't exposed for his truce breaking during the Leviathan attack. Still, I would have to deal with this, or he would keep pestering me about it.

"That's nice dear," Dragon's electronic voice came through the speakers on our armbands, "but you'll have to bring it up about after the fight. Right now I'm busy talking to a platypus about a pharmacist."

I managed to suppress a flinch of sympathy for my fellow super villain. That Agent P was a threat to all law a-breaking super villains!

As Behemoth was struck by a green ray fired from an orbiting satellite and was suddenly transformed into a flock of moths I chuckled at my brief mental descent into hammy silver age super villainy. I might do that full time next loop.

…

Oh my gods! The Behe-moths still had dynakineticism!

My evil laugh could not be restrained as the possibilities exploded before my eyes.

8.8 (Prim-the-Amazing)

I was headed back to Winslow High the day after my Trigger event when he found me. Huh. It usually took him a shorter amount of time to find me. He often accosted me on my way back home from the Locker Incident, or, on some admittedly hilarious occasions, while I was still inside the locker. Christ, the looks on the trio's faces. Priceless.

He offered me an uprooted bush. I accepted it with a sigh. He smiled slightly.

There was a method to his madness, I could see, after so many Loops of him hounding me. He observed that romantic couples often exchanged foliage (flower bouquets), and so he got some foliage to get me as well, in an attempt to woo me. This wasn't even the first time he'd pulled this particular trick. I remembered the time he'd given me a Redwood tree, after hearing someone stupidly say in his hearing range that 'bigger was better' (yes, it was Alec).

I walked to my high school, bush in hand (if I threw it away he'd just try and find a 'better' one), and Scion floated happily after me.

God, I hated crushes.

I'd been pretty freaked out the first time it had happened, the first sign. It wasn't a particularly unusual Loop. So far I'd broken out Marquis from the Birdcage, convinced Amy to abandon her adopted family and elope with me and her father (it was always so easy to do that if I made sure to first kill Victoria and make it look like an accident and then give Amy time to mourn a bit first), and we'd been posing as a nomadic group called 'the Associates'.

We were walking down the streets of Canada, covered in Heartbreaker's blood, citizens shrieking and fleeing at the sight of us, discussing where we should visit next (Amelia and Marquis wanted to go to France, and I was considering overthrowing the Yàngbǎn again), when he showed up.

He took a kitten stuck up in a tree and carefully placed it on the ground. And then he looked at me. He stared. As usual, he radiated his emotions and he felt, he looked, shocked. Curious. Hopeful.

He had no reason to pay attention to me, to feel like that, to change his facial expression! Yet he did it.

After the Loops had started, I'd taken a strange approach to surprises. On the one hand, few things surprised me these days, so I absolutely loved it when it happened. On the other hand, I only did so when I understood the surprises, could explain them to myself, why so and so was doing so. When I didn't understand them, couldn't explain them, I-

Well, long story short, I, at the ripe old age of fifteen, somehow managed to die of a heart attack. Despite the greatest healer in the world and a freaking Entity interested in me being only feet away.

Just my fucking luck.

So then I'd woken up in the locker. Again. I couldn't stop thinking about the Scion thing, so I sought him out. He pretty much had the same reaction as the last time he'd seen me, shock, hope, and curiosity. I decided to carefully question him about this.

"What the fuck!?" I said.

That was apparently a bad idea, as then he tried to reply. In his native language, for lack of a better term.

GREETINGS

That single word consumed me and my entire existence. Each syllable, packed with so many nuances, so many underlying ideas and thoughts and emotion.

It tore my body up into mush on impact.

When the next Loop started I sighed, and decided to do something that I had mixed feelings about. Contessa. My instant win button. Also my biggest crutch. She made everything so easy when I used her. So boring. But I didn't have time to solve this mystery the hard way. I was curious now.

If I'm let out of this locker and told what's different about me now, I'll kill the Endbringers. I decided, careful to leave out any mentions of Scion. He blocked her power. She'd want the Endbringers dead. There was no way to control them to hurt Scion (that she knew of), so all they did was kill potentially useful Capes. The world would be better off without them.

Barely a moment later I heard the sound of someone opening the lock on the door to my locker. A second later and it opened, and I fell into a suited woman's waiting arms. I looked up at her expectantly.

"Your power, it's so old, so experienced. More so than any shard has had the possibility to be before, so it's not just budding anymore, it's growing. You're becoming less human." She wrinkled her nose in confusion at what had just come out of her mouth, but just shrugged and walked away.

I didn't bother to watch her leave. Contessa's power was of limited help in this situation, as it was so close to Scion, but I had enough information to connect the dots. I understood. Slowly, ever so slowly, I was becoming an Entity.

I spent that Loop killing the Endbringers, thinking, and avoiding Scion.

I spent a while uselessly angsting about this, until I finally decided that it didn't matter. No matter how Entity like I became, in the end, everything was still connected to my human brain, which wasn't that sociopathic, thank you very much. I'd once spent a few hundred or so Loops convincing Miss Yamada that I was a perfectly sane and stable individual and succeeded. Eventually.

I tried to see if this growing thing made my powers any different. Turned out, it did. I now had my bug powers, but I could also switch to my Khepri power set. I learned that the Khepri power set had the same limitations as the original one, rapidly disappearing sanity, for one, when I woke up in my locker again, a fresh new Loop before me. At least my sanity (what little I had left) came back to me when I died and started a new Loop. My bug powers turned on automatically at a new life.

After that, I made sure to keep my Khepri powers in reserve, except for on special occasions, and I usually switched back to my bug powers before I became too much of a drooling wreck to even consider it.

After a while, I got more powers to switch between. Mainly Master powers, but there were some different ones here and there. It was pretty cool. And I managed to get enough powers that I didn't instantly die whenever Scion tried to talk to me his way (although I did get a nasty migraine from some of our longer 'conversations', if they could be called that. Scion wasn't that bright).

But what was more annoying was the side effects of that. As I acquired more and more powers and became more and more Entity like, the less and less closer Scion had to be to me to notice me. He usually did as I said, but if it was one thing I couldn't order him to do, it was leave me alone. He just couldn't bring himself to leave my side for too long. He was, for lack of a better way to put it (and because it was true, sadly), in love with me. Hopelessly, head over heels, blindly, doubtlessly in love with me.

According to Dinah, it postponed the end of the world to exactly after my natural death, at least. I had to take her word on it, as the Loops didn't really last that long. And apparently my natural life span was absurdly long now as Scion pulled out all the powers he had to elongate it when he noticed that I aged like normal humans for some reason. He was kind of sweet, for the guy who often killed almost everyone I knew on the most epic murder spree of mankind. Well, until I became a viable mate for him, at least.

If I didn't take great pains to try and hide it, it usually came out fairly quickly. The reactions varied. Cauldron usually either did something ridiculously drastic (kill me, kidnap me, protect me with their life, one notable time making me Queen Mistress of the entire world) or nothing at all that I could see. The trio collectively pissed their pants, the Protectorate became overly aggressive in their eagerness, until they ticked off Scion of course, at which point they followed the trio's example, dominating the local Cape scene became even easier than it had been before, and PHO always bugged the fuck out in the most entertaining way possible.

He made things a lot harder, in some ways, and a lot easier in others. What mattered was, he had good intentions. Sort of. Vaguely. I tried not to think about it too much, to be honest.

Which brought me back to the present. I was entering the school, and Scion was flying behind me, radiating love and devotion, his eyes fully fixed on me. The school body's reaction was fairly hilarious, as usual. Emma fainted, Madison screamed forever, and Sophia jumped out of a window in her haste to run away.

The PRT reacted pretty funnily too, when I insisted on attending all of my classes first before deigning to talk to them. The man who'd been chosen to speak for them, an unassuming man called Thomas Calvert (heh), tried to protest at first, at which point Scion glared so ferociously that Thomas pissed his pants. I was mildly surprised that he didn't collapse that reality.

He dropped an apple tree on my desk and Mr. Gladly stuttered in the middle of his lecture, sweating bullets, and then at my pointed look forced himself to continue.

I put a hand on the apple tree and smiled indulgently at Scion. He smiled back, wider, radiating pleasure at having made me do the face thing that humans did when they were content.

Definitely one of the weirder relationships I'd been in, and that said a lot considering how long I'd had to fool around.

And surrounded by one beyond happy Entity, a class terrified for their lives, a news crew pointing their cameras in at the windows of my class room, PRT vans, Alexandria and most of the local heroes all waiting tensely at the edges of the school property, I really couldn't bring myself to care.

GRATITUDE, I projected.

8.9 (NemiTheNen)

She was a thread, a single strand. Small and fragile, but infinetly more than any other Shard on this world and any other variation.

When Scion looked he could not see how this came to be, how a Shard, unhoused, unmatured, managed to split before attaching to the human female.

A single thread, his partner, smaller than even their offspring would be.

The Entity was aware that she was not as he was, he came to view the world as one of the natives, assuming their form, learning their thoughts; she was the opposite, his opposite. It pleased him, because they were supposed to be complementary, but she was too small and too weak to bare him, to bare the joyous ending that would spread them out to the stars.

Closer observation showed him how her shards were nearly all identical, all administrative shards twisted in various directions. A good start, but not ideal. She needed more shards, more variety. He had to give her ones full and ripe with conflict and power, different from her own, ones that would keep that mortal coil of hers alive, ones that would complement her powers. But not so many as to crush her, infintesimal in size.

Scion sent his awareness out for the most promising of shards, and left in a flash of gold.

Bonesaw looked up, "Oh Fuck."

8.10 (NemiTheNen)

After so many lives Taylor had learned a trick, she could influence her powers.

Her Shard remained the same, a {Control} Shard, but its powers were filtered through her state of mind, her thoughts, her needs, and her very DNA.

When she Awoke in the locker, provided she was of a clear mind when she died, she could throw her metaphorical weight around, heaving her thoughts away from darkness and rot, and instead focus on, say, escape, rending metal, and other such things.

Telekineses, super strength on a few occasions, more often a sort of unnatural awareness of the breaking points of materials. Tinker abilities didn't come often, her Shard was not one that carried information from other civilizations, but she could bend her analysis of other Tinkers. Telepathy of some sort happened frequently, a sort of Kephri-lite.

This time she was focusing on wanting the smell to stop, wanting to control herself, and wanting to be aware of anything other than the small space she was trapped in.

She was going to go for Body Control, specifically, her own body, and Awareness. preferably a sort of astral projection.

When she finally got it to work, the locker opened a 'dead' body fell out.

Taylor metaphorically cackled and kicked her legs back, watching things unfold.

8.11 (NemiTheNen)

The last thing I saw before Scion's open hand, glowing and sliding in sideways fractals, impacted with me chest was his open, hopeful, helpful face turning to one of abject horror.

Taylor Herbert died and Didn't Wake Up.

Oh, I was certainly aware, but I wasn't in the locker, I wasn't...anywhere really. Neither waking not sleeping. Awake, but not.

I was Aware.

Between my {hands} there was a string of {pearls}, {thousands} of them. Glowing, each subtly different from one another, but the {core}, the {irritant} was the same in each.

I {touched} them, and memories sprang up in my mind perfectly vivid and sharp. True recollection, and I nearly wept. There were painful memories here, but they were mine. To forget, to be {severed} from {my anchors} was horror, even if they were gone, I would recall them, and have them with me. Kephri, was I, but monster I would not be, so long as this held.

And this would hold forever.

My {fingers} slipped down the line, tripping over darkness and dwelling on light, feeling the subtle changes where I wrenched my Shard into expressing differently.

So many years, so many lives, loops, some were small where I gave up, or where I was foolish, some were so very long indeed.

Then I reached the last one, and felt it be so different to my {touch}.

I also felt like I was sticking my finger into my belly button which was also somehow my ear.

I felt {energy}, {growths}, {grafts}, {fertiliz}-

ACK.

I {jerked back} and braced myself, what did that crazy idiot do to me? I reached again and...

Shards, additions, one was {projective weapon}, another was {adaptive healing} and yet a third was {biological analysis and data storage}.

There were six more.

The big golden idiot had shoved the Shards of the fucking Slaughterhouse Nine into me.

Stop. Think.

There...I didn't {feel} the memories or shades in them that I felt in my own. Which was a big relief.

Why did he do it? Right, he obviously took me to be some sort of baby Entity or something. But there was no way he couldn't recognize my Shard was from him so...

No, he wouldn't care much about incest, he had been planning on reproducing on this planet and all the 'little' entities would already be paired up. So why couldn't he simply make a new partner on his own? Shards were already growing and budding, my string of {pearls} was proof enough of that.

Unless, of course, he couldn't. He obviously kept a lot of shards to himself, and I knew from personal experience that my Shard wasn't exactly the sharpest tool in the shed, it needed me for it to think, it needed me for direction and personality. Perhaps he couldn't give up enough shards for that sort of thing to be viable without killing himself, but split between two they both could survive and regenerate it so they could repeat the process.

And I wasn't budding. I was...all of my shards were still connected to each other, which was probably why I was getting strong. I probably resembled the mutation that got his species stepping up to being multi-shard organisms, just as my distant ancestor stepped up to become a multi-cellular organism. But I was still by and large identical, undifferentiated.

So he had been trying to feed me, and, uh, force my evolution I guess, to develop specialized shards.

I did not know if my Shard was going to reset after this or not, and I had already pulled massively stupid shit, and I always wanted to be a tinker...

8.12 (Mr Tebbs)

Class being the queen of high school is... surprisingly boring. Glad to see that UnAwake me didn't think the world of Mr. Gladdy. Turning on him would have been, awkward. Fun, to be sure, but still awkward, and I didn't really feel like getting up to too many shenanigans this early on.

I wonder what dinner with Dad will be like.

Actually, why don't I cook for him! I'm always a better cook when I'm in a good mood *Ruummble* and hungry! Well, might as well make something he likes, I'll eat anything I cook.

Hmm. He should be coming home 5:30… I hope he isn't late, food's best when eaten warm. Actually, why don't I just call him? Would that be out of the ordinary? Check the memories and... Eh... yeah it would be, but hell. This is my show now, I don't care what Unawake me would have done.

Dialing "Hey dad?"

"Sweetheart? Is, is something wrong?" He sounds really surprised.

Damn. What the hell old me? "No, not really I was just making sure you were going to be home on time."

"Um, I should be, why?" he sounded thoroughly confused now. I mentally sighed.

"I just have a semi-time sensitive surprise for you."

"Oh? Well, I should be back home at my normal time, I'll see you around 5:30 ok?"

"OK, bye!" *click* Hanging up on my dad… Maybe that'll put him back to rights? Or he's thinking I've got a boyfriend I want him to meet but the guy's only got so much time before he has to go to work or something? Well, whatever. Time to cook! Let's see, consult the memories for what he likes, etc. Hmm. My memories say I'm constantly embarrassed by him. But, it's mostly out in public, so that's something. We still get along fine together at home, which makes sense because for all that my 'past' is different I'm still my father's daughter. Now, for the important memories: Food.

"Taylor! I'm- Wow." Hahaha, he's stopped in his tracks.

"hee hee" Damn, didn't mean for that giggle to escape. "Surprise!"

"That, smells really good." He seems to be in a bit of a daze.. cool. Good to know my cooking's still up to snuff.

"Thanks! It should be ready in a few minutes; I shot for 5:50 for everything to be ready."

"That..thanks. Um…" It looked like questions were fighting for dominance in his head. "What brought this on?" And we have a winner!

"It was just something I wanted to try." I give him my best canary-eating-cat grin. "I left the dishes for you though, wouldn't want you to think I'm mature and domesticated now, would I?"

The conversation was decidedly one sided during dinner, on account of the fact that dad was too busy eating to ask me any questions. At least until he was fuller, anyway. Ahh, small talk with my dad. Especially nice considering he doesn't know he needs to tiptoe around any subject. It's nice being able to be mostly honest with him.

"This is the most amazing dinner I've ever had. Where did you learn to cook like this?"

"Oh I just read it online somewhere, got side tracked on Wikipedia or something?" See? Mostly honest!

"Well, it's amazing"

"Thanks!" despite needing to hide my skill I do love moments like these with him.

"You seem remarkably happy today."

"Uh! well, I'm, uh. I'm just, really happy today!" Ehhehehe, I may have spoken too soon about the mostly honest part...

"I take it school's still going really well then?"

"Oh..yeah.. uh." Crap! Dangerous ground, again. He's expecting me to go to school tomorrow... No, that's not right, he's not even considered that I might not want to go to school tomorrow! Damnit! I don't really want to disappoint him, but what a pain! I'll have to see Sophia, Emma, and... actually just Sophia and Emma. Huh. I wonder what happened to Madison. Oh crap, dad's looking at me funny. I'm frowning. Crap! What happened to my poker face?! I guess it's been a tougher century than I thought.

"Uh, I just remembered." Before he could ask the question. "There might be something unpleasant I need to take care of tomorrow. But it shouldn't be a big deal." I'll take my lumps at school, if nothing else I'll get to enjoy a day of being popular.

"Oh. Well. As, as long as you have it under control... It won't affect your sleepover will it?"

God. Damn. It. "It..might actually." May as well plant that seed now.

The next day

Let's see what it's like walking in the front door of school without needing to worry about the Trio! Oh, hell. Here comes Emma and boy she looks pissed! This is going to end poorly. Hey look, Sophia's chasing after her! This is definitely going to end poorly! I guess I won't get to see what walking thru the front door without being harassed is like. I was worried this loop was going to be weird.

"You call off the sleepover, and you can't even tell me yourself!? Seriously?! Soph gives me some cryptic B.S. excuse and you just-"

Sophia managed to catch up just then, panting a bit. "Woah, woah, let's… let's get." *sigh* "Let's do this somewhere else. Emma, I'm sure she has a good reason, but-"

Emma butts in with a glare. "She cancels the sleepover for no reason, doesn't tell me, apparently tells you, and you're just fine with it!?"

"No", she said. "Uh.. damnit! I can't think straight after sprinting after you like that."

"Why do you even need to think straight?! She either did or she didn't!"

"That doesn't even- I'm trying to remember what she said!"

"Sounds like you're trying to come up with an excuse!"

"All I'm trying to say is we shouldn't be shouting here!"

"Okay, okay okay." As amusing as their banter is, I REALLY need to head this off, before... well, I suppose it's too late now, fan-f#cking-tastic. "I'll clear things up later, but seriously... People are looking at us funny." I hissed. Freaking high school drama.

"Why not now?!"

"I promise I will -later- But! I think everyone needs to cool off a bit, and Sophia's right, we shouldn't be shouting here."

*sigh* "Ok… you promise." Giving me a rather pointed look.

"Yes, I promise!" Jesus, Emma. It's not like I've ever given you a reason not to trust me

As we walk inside, Sophia and I break off for our first period class together. I lean in and whisper "What the FUCK was that, Sophia!?" If other people's heads turned, it just meant they had really good hearing.

"Jesus Taylor, keep it down. I'm right here…"

Ok, maybe not. Deep breaths Taylor. "What, the fuck. I told you to explain it to her, I assumed you'd to keep her under control."

"You told me to 'explain it to her' without mentioning Triggering or Possession, how the hell did you expect me to do that, exactly? It's not like there are any other real reasons. Except for… let's say… time travel?" Sophia smirked. "Something tells me that one would go even poorer than the other two."

"…Worse."

"Huh?"

"Even worse, not even poorer."

"Whatever, stop being such a pedant."

We walked in silence the rest of the way to class. It was, if anything even more boring than yesterday. Afterward I left before I could be stopped; being popular and seeing all these kids as the fakes they are was quickly souring my mood. I seriously hope Sam contacts me soon, not sure how long I can take all this fakeness. Speaking of fakes, I didn't sense Sophia in my immediate area until lunch. Aaaaand, she's sitting down next to me… seriously, is it impossible to give her a hint? I'm practically screaming 'I'm PISSED and don't want to talk to anyone, let alone you!'

May as well call her on it. "Can't you take a hint?"

"Sure…but who do you want me to give it to?"

That took a few seconds to parse… "Wow, that… that was awful."

"Yeah.." She coughed

"Wait, if I'm popular, shouldn't there be, like, a bunch of people around me?" How friggen out of it am I? Or do I always associate eating in the cafeteria with eating alone. That's one hell of a depressing thought. Well, if I wasn't angry before, I was now!

"I told people that you were pissed, and it'd be a good idea to give you and I some space."

Huh. "That's pretty good thinking, actually. Gives you a chance to talk to me alone. Though why you think I want to talk to you is-

"I'm sorry. I, uh.." A pause, was she waiting for me to continue? I hope not, cuz that pretty well wrecked my train of thought, I may as well see where she goes with it. "I've had lots of time to think about things." I chuckled at that, and she cracked a smile for a second. "I get it, I'm huge bitch. I'm one of the first people to hurt you. Hell, I turned your friend on you and-"

"Sophia." I interupt. *sigh* "In my first 'run through' I was a crime lord, went toe to toe with the S9, stared down and killed Alexandria, to say nothing of Coil and Scion, and you think-? Seriously, I don't give a shit about that anymore, I mean hell, that's-"

"Is that why you called off the sleepover then?"

Motherfucking Condescending little shit! The FUCK does she think she is!?. I clenched and relaxed my fist a couple times. Deep breaths. Keep it together.

"I'm sss-" She pauses. Deep breaths Taylor. "no, I'm not sorry for that." It's not worth going to the birdcage for that remark, yet. "You've got some serious hang-ups on the past, and-"

"Sophia" for all that I whispered the word, the room seemed to shake with the force of it. "I Awaken in a filth filled locker. Or in the process of you, Emma, and Madison pouring crap on me. Or five minutes to the end of class to be bounced around by 5 or 6 idiots who are terrible at coming up with insults! How could you possibly think opening myself up to you two- to let that do some real damage- is a good idea for me? I'll take your damn apology, but if you think –for a second– that that's the reason I want as little to do with you as possible, you're delusional and insane."

What, no response to that one Sophia? I can feel my bugs starting to gather. I let them.

I glance at her, and she's actually taken a more meditative air... She meditates? Eh, whatever. I stab a few mouthfuls of food in my maw and continue "You want to be my fwend? Cute. Then in a few years I can end up back in the locker, or covered in soda, or bounced around by your minions and remember that, 'Hey, in a different time and place we can be good friends' and know that it won't happen at least for the next few years, if ever again!" Real it in Taylor, deep breaths, and let's start calling a bee swarm together whynot "I can deal with all the bullshit of a normal Awakening because I can distance myself from it. You want me to let you close so it can hurt worse? Go to hell. I'll fucking send you there myself. You done your deeds and made your choices, hundreds of thousands of times and you'll have to deal with the consequences."

"No."

"No?" I scoff "You won't have to deal with the consequences?"

"No, I didn't choose bullying you." I gave her my best Spock (I've been told it's quite good). "Alright, I made decisions like that a handful of times," she amended, "relatively speaking BUT, I can't actually choose anything different."

She sighs "You're right. Even if we actually become besties, again, we'll most likely end up with me shoving you in That locker. By the time I Wake up, I'll have already been bullying you. Again. And again."

"Right, that's what I said… Which is why I can't really be friends with you'n Emma." I was a bit lost with where she was going with this. It didn't help that I was pissed. I was tempted to just up and walk away (and bee her if she tried to stop me), but, eh.. what the hell, it's not like she could really hurt me. Not as bad as I could hurt her anyway.

She seems exasperated. "Taylor, there is no possible way I can prevent me, other me, from shoving you in There. Except for the few times I Woke Up just in time to flub the push and you spun me in there instead. By the time the three of us are pouring soda on you, the entire campaign is running on inertia. I can't stop it. Believe me, I've tried, there are too many people involved."

"So... What are you saying, exactly? You want to stop it but you can't?" Bullshit. I think I'm done here.

"Pretty much. At least without doing something drastic and stupid."

Ah ha. She's afraid of spoiling her image. That's adorable. I gave a snort, maybe I'm not done here just yet. "I figured something drastic and stupid would be your MO."

Sophia scowled at that. "I'm trying to grow as a person here. The usual start times make that somewhat difficult to show."

I tossed that around my head a bit. "That's, fair actually." Eh, the swarm's pretty big now, and it doesn't seem likely I'll need it. Guess I'll just have it disburse? Although…

I thought about it some more. "That doesn't explain why you were trying to be all buddy-buddy with me, this time. I mean, making my life not hell and being best buddies with me don't need to go hand in hand. At all."

Sophia fidgeted a bit at that. "Yesterday I said I wanted to get to know you. I meant it then, I mean it now, I want to get to know you." She tried to stare me down, but fidgeted under my gaze. "Fine, I also wanted to figure out how you think. Well, a you anyway."

"Oh." Ah, a Fucking spy. Get in nice and close, the better to slide the knife. Bitch. Guess I am going to swarm you again. I let the silence hang for a minute or two. Enough time to gather a decent ball of black flies and other filler directly over her head. Fewer bees than I'd like but I guess I can wait for them to catch up. Time to stall. "You wanted to get to know me? To what end?"

Left unsaid: Sophia, give me one good reason why I shouldn't drop this on you right now.

Heh heh, she's spooked. I love puting the fear of Me into people.

"Nothing malicious!" Words almost tripping out of her mouth. "I just wanted to figure out some way of talking to you that didn't involve getting into an all out cape fight or bees!"

Uhm.. "What?"

"You're hard to talk to! Well, hard for me to talk to, anyway. I mean, look at this conversation! And... I wanted to try something different because I'm, uh, kinda sick and tired of getting Bees as soon as I Wake Up, or getting Eaten Alive shortly after. It..it sucks. A lot."

That's a pretty good reason, actually. Assuming she isn't lying. Well, I'll be able to figure that out, I'm pretty sure. Just need her to talk some more… "A lot of the times I get Bee'd I have maybe 2 or 3 minutes to do anything then my body mass in bees start stinging and trying to carry me away. Sometimes I don't even know what happens, I'm dead before I can scream, or a brown recluse follows pain follows black widow and that's always fun…"

She seems pretty distant, I wonder if she's having flash backs? I give her a glance and..wow, she's got the Stare. That's… I'd better just let her work through this. Maybe? Or will she get violent if-

"Of course" she says, breaking me out of my reverie. "nothing compares to the attention of Bonesaw when she's pissed AND motivated to make you suffer." 100% true, that's something I wouldn't wish on anyone. "That said, getting bee'd and eaten are a lo~t more common." She let that simmer with me for a few.

Holy shit, I think I broke her. What the hell am I supposed to do with a broken Sophia? Should I disburse the swarm? I don't see how this could be a trick or a trap, if she wanted to attack me she'd have done it already, especially in her current state of mind. At the same time, it's not like she's sane either... I'll keep it in reserve incase she snaps.

Damn, just how often have I killed her? I know I'd occasionally have my swarm eat her in her bed, How often did I do that? I remember one time she was really confused for a split second before, futilely, trying to save herself. Fuck, I think I did that to her and her family once. I wonder if I let them live after she died? Probably not, there were a few times where I just needed to attack her to vent the last few loops. Jesus, am I feeling bad for Sophia?

Neither of us were touching our *ahem* 'food' now. Apparently the conversation killed her appetite, and I'd kinda lost mine thinking back to the times I'd had my swarm eat her. "This is a bit out of character for you." I say, more to distract myself than anything. She gave a puzzled look at that. I tried to clarify "Don't you normally punch problems til they aren't problems, or something?"

She gave a bark of a laugh. "Well, despite popular belief to the contrary, I can learn from my past mistakes." I gave her a flat look. "Eventually, anyway." Cough. "So, buddy-buddy is out, too awkward. Is there any other way I can convince you not to eat me, or bee me -or hell the school, for that matter- the first day you Wake Up?"

That's.. a good question. Do I trust that she doesn't really want to mess with me anymore? Hell even towards the end of the first run thru we could work together. That said.. my Awakenings are usually awful. not sure I care, buuuut, unstable Loopers are bad for everyone… I'm knowingly getting into a bad situation, so how do I protect myself while still giving her a chance to show she's Awake? Is she trying to play to my sympathies so she can get even with me later? And She really can't stop her unawake self from bullying me, either. Do I want to give her a chance to fake me out? I can be prepared for a physical attack, but giving her a chance to go 'eh, changed my mind do your worst, bitch' will be a more effective attack after this than just about anything except for a sadistic Bonesaw. *shudder*

Eh, what the hell, I suppose she is trying to make an effort. "Do your damnedest to make my life less hell, and... sure, why not. Though you might need to act quick on that front. I've had a few bad centuries before and just went nuts on the city." It's not like I'd ever be able to trust her, but I won't really have to. Make it a rule of sorts. This way if she doesn't want to get ea-i-mean-severely bee'd-then she needs to act in my interests, regardless of trust. Maybe.. "Oh, and make sure my life continues to be not hell if you want to stay unbee'd. I think my new rule of thumb is: torment me and I bee you."

She nodded, after a while she said "Okay, makes sense; I'll think of something to get 'em off you quick. Unless you had something in mind?"

I thought. "Punch the first kid you see picking on me?"

*sigh* "I thought you didn't want me to solve problems by punching?"

"I never said that, I was just surprised you were branching out, as it were." Giving her a shiteating grin.

Sophia rolled her eyes at that. "Well, if nothing else works, I guess I'll use my old standby then."

"That works for me, Though I suppose we can play it by ear or think of something else if this doesn't work."

"Okay. Anyway, thanks for at least considering it. I s'pose I should get used to the idea of doing something that lands me in jail then."

I'd forgotten about that, she's on her third strike "Believe it or not, I'd rather not be picked on or have to attack people to find some measure of peace, AND I don't want you to see me as some kind of final boss or whatever that keeps throwing you in jail. After the Locker should be easy to solve, just get bored and move on. But for-"

And we began to discuss strategies for a bit, and managed to reach a tenuous agreement for the most common awakenings. It wasn't perfect, it would need refining, but it was a start at least.

*Brrrrring*

We each looked at our mostly uneaten trays. "Eh, kinda lost my appetite pretty quick into that conversation. Didn't really get hungry after."

"Same here."

"What are you going to tell Emma?" Sophia asked, standing up.

"Me?"

"You honestly expect me to come up with anything that'll get her to stop pestering you?"

"All this time on your hands and you still can't come up with a good lie." I got a scowl for that. "I'll think of something."

A thought occurred to me "Oh.. if you don't mind my asking, what brought about this branching out from punching of yours?"

Sophia looked like she caught a whiff of something foul. "Uh" she glanced around. "I'll tell you later? This isn't a good place."

I did a sweep too, and she was right. "Sure, see you around, I guess."

After lunch Sophia and I had math together, and Soph decided to sidle up to me as we were taking our seats.

"Hey, Taylor."

"Yeah?"

"You hear that, in addition to everything else they stand against, the E88 also hate calculus?"

"No... Really?"

"Yeah, calculus forces integration."

Math class went less than smoothly after Sophia's unexpected joke. It was all I could do to keep it together. "Ow, my sides… Where'd you learn that one?"

Sophia gathered herself before saying, "I had a really good math Prof once in a near hub world. I never get tired of telling it."

"Excuse me! Would you ladies like to join the rest of the class?" crap, speaking of math teachers…

"Oh, we, ah.." I floundered

"We were just talking about, um calculus!" Sophia… not helping, as I had to reign in my laughing again.

"Yeah" may as well get in on it. "Like, the, uh. Difference between Newton's version and Leibnitz's"

"Right! Like, Newton's was first, but only he could do the entire Taylor Expansion to use it properly, but Leibnitz wasn't as smart-ish, and figured out some formulas are, uh, anti-derivatives, of….others." Sophia kinda lost steam towards the end, and the rest of the class had gone glassy-eyed with the teacher giving us a Look. "We'll uh, we'll be quiet now."

"Good." Sophia and I shared an oops look.

After class I had only one viable story to tell Emma: I'd gotten a job. It still seemed flimsy, to me. I suppose I'd have been embarrassed of needing a job, but I'm sure I'd have told Emma? Eh, honestly that's kind of up in the air, really. Hmm, maybe if the job was embarrassing? Or the reason behind it was embarrassing, now I'm getting somewhere! Dad and I are still struggling, so there's that. I wouldn't want a burger flipping job (well, I don't want a burger flipping job). So… maybe I can work for Parian? I've still got my ability to make cloth, so there's that. Well, it's the best I've got.

Sophia walked up to me in the hall between classes. Which period am I in anyway? Damned, efficient autopilot. "So you have anything?" She asked.

"About 3/4ths an idea with no fall back." I reply. "Tell her that I've got a job working for Parian, and she doesn't want me to tell anyone I work for her, in case some capes try to recruit her or something."

"Oh. That's pretty good… I was just thinking, what if we told her the truth?" I gave her another Spock. "Not the whole truth! They'd throw us in a padded room and throw away the keys! I was thinking tell her the part where we're going to save the world from a giant murderous space whale that wants to eat our children and cupcakes."

I, what? The only part i could latch onto was: "Cupcakes?"

She grinned. "That's about the only worthwhile thing I can think of that we'd actually contribute to the space whale; everything else has already been done." Was she serious? "I mean, have you seen a cape power devoted to cupcakes?" I made something resembling a hawk drowning. "There ya go, our shard, as humanity, would have been cupcakes. For the space whale."

I needed a reboot. "I'm impressed at how good of a straight man you are."

"Thanks, I've been working on it quite awhile. You've never given me a chance to banter… not that I can blame you, honestly. I can hardly stand myself sometimes…" Her eyes had gone wide as she finished that sentence. Hmm.

"Does that have something you being less punchy?"

"It does…but I was hoping to give you a dramatic reveal?" She looked, kinda eager, actually. Eh what the hell, you only get a dramatic reveal once.

"Heh, alright."

"Awesome, I'll see if Emma will let us come over after school, and I can…do my reveal then. Want I should tell her the 'reason' the sleep over is off?" She asked.

"I guess…" No real harm with- wait what's that look, Oh God, what did I just agree to?! "NOT, the space whale one, the other one, the sane one."

"The space whale one is the sane one." Sophia deadpanned. Eh?

"How do you figure that?" I challenge.

"You're saying you aren't going to stop the Golden Git?"

Damnit. *sigh* "You're not wrong.."

After school, we gathered at Emma's house. She was a bit upset that I didn't tell her about the job and that made such a huge deal about working for Parian, but she grudgingly bought the excuse (after I mentioned that me and Dad aren't as well off as her family, anyway). I was a little confused why Sophia wanted to reveal her power set to Emma as well, but I'd filed that under 'Her Problem' anyway. I was kinda curious to see what she'd picked up over the loops, too.

"Alright ladies! To the basement!" Sophia said with a flourish. "It's show and tell time." I shrugged, and Emma looked like a deer in headlights.

"Are… Are you sure?" Emma asked.

"Positive. Besides, I owe Taylor an explanation for my part in the whole, don't tell anyone you work for a cape thing" She replied.

The basement was… interesting. There were several guitars (acoustic and electric), speakers, a drum set and a banjo of all things. "What the hell?" I blurted out. "Where did these come from?" Emma said at the same time.

"Right, so I believe I promised a dramatic reveal." Sophia said, motioning towards the instruments. "Though I believe I should address a few of your concerns before I get into it, Taylor."

I nodded. I've got quite a few questions, right about now, including: 'Where the hell did those instruments come from?! I've been with you since we left school!' but I said nothing.

"First off, yes, Taylor, I am still a psychopath. Time hasn't changed that, and I doubt it ever will."

"Wait, WHAT?!" Emma started. I could only nod with a smirk.

Sophia noticed Emma's blue-screen-of-death look and sighed. "Emma, remember when we first met?"

Emma hunched over at the reminder, and whispered "How could I forget…"

"Right, anyway. The me you saw that night, that is and has always been the "Real" "Me." I'm always that detached, I can't understand why someone feels something, and I am unable to blame myself for anything that goes wrong, even if it is quite clearly my fault."

Emma was starting to look a little less distant. "But that, that doesn't make sense! Ever since we started hanging out… You do know when you've done something wrong, you do get when you've offended or hurt someone, and you do feel bad…"

Sophia was shaking her head by the end. "I've had practice reading people, so I can tell when someone's pissed. I used to use hyper aggression to cover for my lack of understanding, but I've found humor is even more effective. If someone's laughing or confused, that gives me time to sort thru the list I use to keep myself on an even keel, as it were."

Interesting, "But.." I blurt. "you apologized to me, so you must blame yourself for something." Emma gave me a questioning glance, but said nothing.

"The wrong thing, if you'll recall." She retorts. "As for my ability to blame myself for anything well.."

She entered her shadow state, became formless for a second, and then there were two Sophias in front of us. Emma and I both sat bolt upright. Oh god, this is turning into a nightmare!

The Sophias gave each other a once over, and the nearer one spoke "This- " gesturing between herself and…her. "-is not a cloning thing; I've actually divided myself. Uh, each of us has roughly half the power of us when we're whole."

"So… how does this have anything to do with acknowledging when you've messed up?" I ask.

"Oh!" the farther one perks up. "When I/we recombine, whole me gets the memories from both of us."

"So.." Emma trailed off.

"So, let's say-" the nearer one began "- we go out on patrol together and she" indicating the other Sophia "misses a shot with the tranq darts we use. And because she missed, the perp manages to blast me once in the arm before I can take him down. In that situation, I'll blame her for being a bad shot, and she'll blame me for not being fast enough to take control of the situation."

The farther one continued. "When we recombine, I get both sets of memories, and both experiences... The result is inescapable, I done fucked up."

"So, you end up with empirical evidence that you're to blame for something bad happening to you" I say, if only to make sure I understand "…wow… So-"

"I'm able to blame myself because of the scientific method, essentially." The farther one says.

"Hypothesis: I am not at fault, gather contradictory evidence to the hypothesis, therefore the hypothesis is false. Therefore I'm at fault." The nearer one explains.

"So, what's with the instruments, then?" Emma asked. Huh, I'd kinda forgotten about them.

"I'm glad you asked!" Nearer Sophia exclaims. "I decided to make a band with my new found ability" cue the dual facepalms. "because it helps train me to work with me!"

"How does that work?" I moan.

"Well," the nearer one starts. "If I…we, whatever, fuck up a song it's never 'My' fault" giving air quotes. "Except that it is when I recombine." The farther one picked up where the nearer left off. "A wrong note feels wrong, gets the point across to me/us, and it's hella safer than constantly going on patrol with myself." With that, farther Sophia picks up one of the electric guitars and asks "any requests?"

I'm feeling kinda mischievous, "What's the one everyone always requests? Free…bird?" I say, giving her a shiteating grin. Emma gave a smirk of her own adding "Yeah, that's a great song!"

Both Sophias give us a look that could melt steel. "Fucking hate you." The farther one finally says, as the nearer Sophia approaches her. The two recombine for a split seconds and then there are three Sophias in front of me. The one getting behind the drums says "ok, usual rules for a duel, I think? First one to bleed loses."

Bass guitar Sophia answers "Sounds good to me." While the other nods her head.

"Wait what?"

"Never heard the line 'Played it 'til my fingers bled'?" Lead Sophia smirks

My stomach drops, "I get the feeling that I'm going to regret that smartass request I made." An evil grin from all three is my only answer. Then they begin to play… surprisingly well, actually. Equally surprising is Sophia's singing. She's quite good.

Then they played the outro.

And they kept playing the outro.

AAAAAAAnd they Kept PLAYING the OUTRO.

After 30 minutes, Emma and I try to run upstairs but the guitar Sophias simply jump through the floor to follow us, complete with smaller Sophias carrying their amps.

"JESUS! Did you make your own roadies!?" Emma yelled.

The smaller Sophias' response was, "You started this mess, you're gonna see it til we're done if it fucking kills you."

"If I get tinnitus from this I swear to god Sophias" was my reply. I will not swarm three Sophias, I will not swarm thre-five! five Sophias! I will not swarm five Sophias.

The ones on the guitars didn't even spare us a glance as they kept rocking out, occasionally flashing to shadow form. We decided to return to the basement. If nothing else we'd have a place to sit. Eventually Emma had to go to the bathroom, threatening fire and brimstone if any Sophias followed her in.

"Ok, where the hell did you learn all this!?" I shouted, out of necessity, when we were alone. Sort of.

One of the smaller Sophias answered, from behind my left ear scaring the crap out of me. "WELL. I..we.. whatever, replaced Nightmare Moon once! After the loop ended I kept her power set, so I'm much stronger than normal, I can teleport myself, people, and channel weather magic in my shadow form (though only in my shadow form), and obviously divide myself into multiple 'people', again in shadow form! Hell, in that form I can fly thanks to my light weighted-ness and weather magic!"

After I got my heart under control I managed to reply "cool… and you can sneak up on me, which is pretty tough to do!"

"Yup!" Her smaller self excitedly said. "When dividing my Self, the smoke form has almost no substance to it, so there's not much for your bugs to notice."

"Got any other cool tricks?"

"Yup!"

A pause, while we listened to her bigger selves jam the hell out. "Anything you'd care to share?"

"Nope!" Little Sophia giggled, shuffling her feet. She was quite adorable

"Are you trying to get me to squee?"

"Yup!"

I sigh. "So…why do you have 'dueling rules' for playing music?" we still had to shout to be heard which made her inflections kind of weird.

Little Sophia changed gears so fast it gave me whiplash (she still had a kid's voice tho). "Because I need to have clear definitions of winning and losing! If I don't and I'm able to blame someone else for why I wasn't doing as well as I thought I could, or if I fail, I will! More than that, I have to blame someone else if I can, my disorder won't let me do anything else! If that's you or Emma, then so be it, but that might be kinda dangerous; because when I divide myself like this I get different ratios of my personality disorder!" *sigh* "basically it took me a very, very long time to be able to do any of this!" she said, indicating the Sophias playing.

"It used to be, I would almost Instantly try to Fight Myself! Then, when I reCombined I'd remember both Sides of the Fight! It Was…Not Fun! Also found out that Any Damage one of us Gets Comes with us when we Recombine, to an Extent! So when I'd piss myself off, I'd get into a fight with me, get myself hurt, which would piss me off more and… yeah. So, instead of me being well, me, I came up with rules to follow! That way when I divide, every Sophia knows the rules, why the rules are there, and agrees to play by them! It keeps me from being as much of a massive bitch, and frankly, I've had a lot more fun since I started doing things by the rules, so I want to keep doing things this way!"

"I see.." I say absently as I try to absorb all that.

"That said, fuck you very much for asking for Freebird, and enjoy the jam session!"

The Sophias finally stopped playing an hour and a half after they started. Everyone involved was still partially deaf the next day, and I will never be able to listen to anything Skynyrd ever again.

Well, maybe just for the next century.

8.13 (BurnNote)

It began, like most things where Jack was concerned, with murder. And so Reilly became Bonesaw, who saw the world much clearer. There was beauty in all things, though occasionally it took a bit of work to dig them out. There were some rough times, but, like with most things where Jack was concerned, it could be solved by murder.

The world went on; there were, since Jack was concerned, a lot of murders and murderers, and if she was a bit lonely, then surely that was because she hadn't found the right way to murder yet.

It also began, like some things where Jack is concerned, before a murder. In this case, a particular preachy parahuman proscribed her perfectly pretty personage. She was rather surprised how much it hurt to be told that no one would ever be her friend. Murder had helped, like it always did where Jack was concerned, but her pride was still injured. She'd show that silly mouse.

She decided to make a friend. Her first try was rather successful, and Jack even praised her for it, which was rather rare, since Jack had high standards where murder was concerned. But she always felt she could have done more, if only because it only took one murder, and more murders were always better, where Jack was concerned.

It was born, like most things where Bonesaw is concerned and Jack close by, shortly after a series of murders. It was a pony, because all little girls wanted ponies, and it was pink, because she didn't have any fur on hand and had worked with the available materials. It tended to rip open and spill organs when she rode it, but that just made it kinda like a pinata, which where fun.

Fun, her new friend had told her, was important. It was essential for Friendship, and since Bonesaw made her friend for that, she had to know. She'd also asked Jack, and he was rather sceptical, but after a demonstration he was happy and approved, like always when murder was concerned.

Her friend taught her a lot of things about friendship. Like Generosity, which meant you had to share body parts, but got delicious cupcakes or pies. She really liked the pinkie pie, even if it was a chore to get all those fingers. Her favorite virtue was Murder. It was just like normal murder, except you did it with friends. This was clearly the reason Jack always surrounded himself with people who would inevitably die.

It ended, like all her friends, with murder. Except for once, she wasn't happy, though Jack certainly didn't mind, since he never did where murder was concerned. Most likely, this was because she didn't do the murdering. Jack told her to just stop moping, but Bonesaw found she just couldn't. This was the first time that happened. Jack was never wrong where murder was concerned, and murder was always concerned where Jack was involved.

That meant she was back to her most dreaded problem: How to murder properly to solve the problem. It seemed to come so easily to Jack, but Bonesaw found it much harder, mostly because it was the only thing that couldn't be solved with murder. It was her darkest hour, and Jack was increasingly unhelpful.

In the end, friendship came to her rescue when she remembered one thing she'd learned from it, but never dared to try: It was fun to murder with friends, but the most fun thing was to murder friends.

She did. It was kinda hard, since her friends didn't understand friendship as well as she did, but she was a smart and methodical girl and succeeded after some rough spots. Jack seemed proud and rather happy, which was just natural, since murder was concerned, even if it was his own.

Bonesaw became Reilly, who swore to share all she'd learned about friendship with the world.

And that's how Equestria was made.

8.14 (NemiTheNen)

I'm not an idiot, especially working with tinker shards like I can. I know that Scion can change me, hurt me, and it will carry over to the next loop.

He could disfigure my mind, my shards, and I would not heal. I would not reset. All it would take would be for him to foresee that I would never do what he wants.

Unless I would, from madness, loneliness, or boredom. I've done stupid shit before, joined the Slaughterhouse, the Blasphemies, the Endbringers. I could go that way. Especially if humanity was all gone.

But, I don't want to be like him, I don't want to think about it. I also don't want to be maimed.

Maybe Crawler's Shard could let me heal even if the reset doesn't. But who knows what will happen to me because of the healing?

I need...I need more time. And I know exactly how to get it.

Right now I have all my shards bundled together to hide, I just look like a very mature shard from a distance. Eventually the trick won't work, but I'm already working on another plan.

But right now? I stand outside the school, alone in the crowed, the mad girl carefully avoided, and unfold.

I'm fairly certain I'm glowing a little. I'm also fairly certain that I'm doing the equivalent of flashing a bit of leg on the highway to get a ride.

It takes him a few minutes to get here, and I have to say I'm disappointed. But the reactions never get old.

Now, all I have to do is to communicate to the big idiot exactly which shard I want. Hell, maybe this loop I'll pick his brain in general, I'm getting better at parsing and communicating with him.

But I need that Shard. I need to be able to reset.

The next loop I emerge from the Locker all in gray.

8.15 (Mr Tebbs)

Pinkie Pie Awoke as a human. Ohhh, I like being human! I get fingers again! Pinkie also Awoke fighting. Wait, what? I hate fighting, ugh. Well, looks like I'm replacing this Faerie Queen person. After Pinkie got one last good hit in on...Grey Boy, seriously? Pinkie asks. "Hey! You! Wouldn't you rather have a party than a fight?"

Grey Boy responds "Nah. I'd rather make you suffer, bitch." As soon as he finished, he caught Pinkie Pie in his time bubble. He slowly limped over to her. "Well, looks like you won't get to party anymore, sorry about that.." He reached into his effect, grabbing her hand while holding a knife in the other.

"Sorry about this." Pinkie said as she sucked his out power -and life force. Then ate it.

I hate killing.. Oh wait! I can stop time now! As soon as she has the thought, a time loop bubble surrounds Grey Boy, saving his life but leaving him to nearly die in perpetuity. A shame I have to leave him like this... most of my useful gear is locked away. She thought while pulling out a cupcake. "Well, one crisis at a time, I guess, Though I'd still-" She turns to the immobile Grey Boy. "Hey, do you know where the biggest grumpy grumpersons are? I want to cheer someone up and maybe get a cape that can help you."

"Go to...Hell."

"Nahh, I'll open up The Eye of Parties before that happens. Hm..." She took a bite of her cupcake and tossed another one to Grey Boy. No elements active, no response from my pings... either the anchor is going stealth or isn't Awake yet. How about my element of Laughter then? WOAH there's a HUGE sad frumpy McAngrypants just flying around all over the place…well, I'll need the Eye of Parties at least to cheer him up. That'll have to wait until I can unlock the rest of my gear. Now how about something … doable. "OOH! OOH! I found some nastie saddies over there!" she points in some direction. "I'll show them exactly how to party, then we'll be friends, and maybe they'll be able to help me help you!" Besides If my loop memories are any indication, this world needs a global Pinkie Party, and I'm just the Premiere Party Pony to make it happen!

-Many parties later

Jack sneezed. Uh-oh. He thought. Someone's pursuing us... Someone powerful.

"Hi! Do you like parties?" A voice, female, asked hanging upside down in front of Jack's face.

Jack regained his composure quickly. A teleportation power it seems. "Somewhat, though I prefer to put on a show."

"OOH, what kind of show?" The pink girl asked, hopping down and bouncing on her heals.

*FLASH* "One of death, and hopelessness, to show the people what they really are. Nothing but cowering flesh or fated to die futilely." One more misguided fool taken care of.

"That doesn't sound anything like a party, or a show.." the pink thing said next to his right ear.

GAH! I fucking cut her to ribbons! he looked from the pink thing next to him to where he was aiming a moment ago, and saw dust settling. Jack tried to elbow her in the side in preparation for another attack, and hit nothing but air.

"Sheeesh, you'd think you've never seen someone inexplicably appear next to you before."

Where is she now?

"Hi! ...Do you like ponies?"

Jack looked around and saw the pink thing by Bonesaw. Wait, ponies?

Bonesaw giggled, "I love ponies! Why?"

"Hee hee.. you could say that... I have one" the pink thing responded.

"You do?!" the pink thing just nodded.

Jack slashed at her neck, but instead of blood the pink thing flashed and became...a pony. The two stared at the apparent impossibility that was now nuzzling Bonesaw. "SO CU~TE!" She squealed, proving that she was a human girl after all.

"Aww, aren't you the nicest little girl?" the pink thing cooed.

It dodged another slash attempt from Jack, inexplicably appearing behind a rock. How can I be missing?! I. Don't. Miss! "Where's the rest of the nine?" he said absently.

"OHH! Ohh! I know the answer! Um.. most of them weren't very happy having powers, or were making people miserable by having powers, so I took them after I beat them up!"

"You, you took their powers?

"YUP, had to put them in stasis before they died though.."

"You killed..umm..." The hell were their names again?

"What about sis Siberian?" Bonesaw asked, with some concern in her voice.

"Which one is...Oh, Him! I found him a few days ago. He was so sad, so I threw him a party to cheer him up-"

"Her" Jack corrected, after failing to cut the pink abomination. Again.

"Silly! Siberian is obviously an impenetrable manifestation taking the form of someone's daughter within a fairly small projection radius!" That's not obvious at all, and WHY CAN'T I CUT HER?! Jack screamed internally.

"So I found a guy who looks like her and snuck up on him while no one was looking and threw him a party!" the pink pony thing continued to bounce. Making Jack's attacks continue to miss. "During the party he told me what happened to his daughter so we had a small wake for her then I used my new time powers to brew some booze six times at once to make it to 220 proof then we each had a few glasses and I don't remember what happened after that for some reason but then he let me take his power after I made his headache go away and I put him in stasis so I can have little Scalpel here fix him!" She gasped for air after her long winded explanation, re-inflating her mane.

Jack didn't even bother trying to slice the pink thing this time. "Wow." The Slaughterhouse 9 are down to two, effortlessly.

"Silly Cat Scratch! The slaughterhouse nine are down to Zero members!"

Both Jack and Bonesaw tried to attack the pink thing when she said that, with both ending up face first in the dirt. That wasn't a teleport, did she just... and then... NOPE, stopping that train of thought right there, that way lies madness. Actually, did she just respond-

"We three!" she indicated around herself "Are the Laughterhouse N now!"

"Um.. who are you, anyway." Bonesaw asked as she picked herself up from the ground.

The pink thing immediatly went bright red. "Uh-um, didn't I introduce myself?"

"Nope."

"Oh.. well, call me Pinkie Pie!"

*Thonk*

-Days later

"I'm not going to fix any more people if you keep calling me Scalpel" 'Scalpel' pouted. "I'm Bonesaw!"

"Well, I can't call you bonesaw; 'cause you don't even have a bonesaw!" Pinkie retorted. Then sighed. "Fiiiiine, what do you want your name to be?"

"Um... Sanguine?" She suggested while fixing another ex-S9 member.

Pinkie muttered something about Bethesda suing someone. "Eh..not very party like considering your costume? How about Sanguine Scalpel? OOH, ooh! SUPER Sanguine Scalpel!" Pinkie Exclaimed.

How is that better? Jack thought.

That got a giggle. "Ok, S3 for short?"

"Ehhhh, Not as bad as S2 I suppose." Pinkie said, then mumbled something about 'Instrumentality.'

Jack cursed that Pinkie kept dodging his blades.

"Your name is still CAT Scratch!" Pinkie declared pointing at Jack. "NOW" turning to the group of newly non-capes "who of you newly ex-S9 members wants to have a Party?"

-Many parties later

"Are you making bombs?" Cat Scratch asked, incredulous walking into Pinkie's temporary workshop. "I knew it, I knew you'd see that-"

"Nope!" Pinkie replied, cheerful as ever.

"It's not a bomb?"

"Nope! It's my latest version of the Party Petard!" She showed him with a flourish.

"It looks like the most cheerful clay pot with a fuse I've ever seen." He deadpanned.

Pinkie giggled. "Observe!" she lit it and threw it in the middle of the room they were in. It exploded in a perfect place setting, leaving a tablecloth, cake, dishes and plastic cutlery.

Cat Scratch was at a loss. "Did- did you just..demilitarize weapons?"

"NOPE! I just Party-fied em. You want to cut the cake Cat Scratch?"

"I'd rather cut you. Into tiny little-"

"Cat Scratch" Pinkie said, suddenly serious. "Do you want to hear about my ideas for the next round of cupcakes for-"

"NO! DEAR GOD IN HEAVEN NO, NOT AGAIN!" screamed Jack -er- Cat, scrambling to get away from her.

Ahh, Pinkie thought. Glad I had a chance to weaponize my Pinkie Babble in the leaf village that one time; it's a lot nicer than hurting people. He's a tough cookie, though; took a full 2 minutes to crack. Still, I suppose I'll let him choose the next party place for threatening him...

"I always know exactly where a party is needed, but I've got to admit, Cat, this place was a good call." Pinkie said "This mean old' asylum needed some serious cheering up."

"I'm a bit surprised you caught the roof on fire." he blinked. "Oh, is that why you always choose where we go?"

"Yupperoonie! And well...I did have a slight malfunction with my Party Canon Mk2, but it was Mimi and Labyrinth's idea honestly." Pinkie answered, not bouncing for once on account of said two women stroking her mane. Jack noticed they were singing "We don't need no water let the motherfucker burn. Burn motherfucker. Burn." over and over.

"Besides! I already got everypony -oooh..." Pinkie melted for a moment under their grooming "erhm. I already got everyone out."

After a moment, Pinkie jumped back to her feet, startling her groomers. "OH! Thanks to Mimi, I don't need to use my off-screen teleport as much; I can just use her fire-port! And thanks to Labyrinth, I can now make a Perfect Party Place anywhere!"

Jack blinked. God..damnit. *flash* God DAMN it! missed again!

-Many parties later

"I think we should go to Madison this time!" Pinkie shouted.

"Um." the pimply faced teenaged boy behind the counter looked completely lost.

"She'll have a Happy Meal and a few apple pies." Super Sanguine Scalpel offered.

"I still can't believe we're in Madison, friggen, Wisconsin. In the middle of winter!" one of the LN complained. "There's, like, nothing here!"

"Exactly! Which is why we're here: to cheer people up!" Pinkie replied.

After several minutes of setting up the next party (with S3 setting up her triage for 'grumpy capes that didn't like their powers') the air raid sirens began sounding.

Cat Scratch put 2 and 2 together fastest shouting "You brought us here for AN ENDBRINGER FIGHT!?"

"Of course not, silly! I brought you here for a search-and-rescue party then a 'we survived an Endbringer' party afterwards!" Pinkie Pie said trotting towards the high rises, shouting over her shoulder "I'm going to go cheer up an Endbringer and see if it won't stop being a big meany-meany pants. If I can, we'll have an even bigger 'WE STOPPED AN ENDBRINGER' party!"

"As soon as I figure out which Endbringer it is" she muttered once she was out of earshot.

Pinkie looked over the city from her perch on a skyscraper, as other buildings began teleporting in and falling to various states of ruin around her. She felt her eyes watering, all those buildings, all those people. I hate losing friends.. even if I haven't met them yet... Ah there she is, the Pinkie finally caught a view of the 15 foot tall alabaster monstrosity; it was flying after several capes on her many, many asymmetrical wings. Pinkie focused on her element. Oh. I can't cheer her up... she's a sort-of-golem, well, there goes that idea... Oh! There's something. It's focusing on... ah, it's a TK. Oh maple, it's a precog! She thought with a smile. Excellent! Just need to get it's attention and this should be a cinch! "HEY! You! Simmy!"

Larch and brambles! It's too focused on those flying capes! Ok Pinkie, just focus on the 'Pinkie Sense', just like I've been doing with Jack Slash all these years. Alexandria sent the beast careening off course buying the capes a chance to bolt. Having lost its quary, the Simurgh began running from Alexandria, bringing it closer to Pinkie. Wait for it, wait for it, waaaait for it. Now! "HEY, WHITE SOOTY!" Pinkie yelled for all she was worth. The Simurgh took notice and came in close. heh heh~ Gotcha!

Alexandria was giving chase to the Simurgh when it swooped down to attack some pink cape on top of a building. Wait, that's a pink horse.. whatever. She shouted a warning to the fool but the Simurgh was already towering over the luckless cape.

Darn, it's got wide angle TK, but isn't very psychic. She mentally shrugged. but it is still precognitive, so I STILL WIN! Pinkie thought to herself as she rather quickly shredded the Endbringers mind.

"F.T.L. thoughts F.T.W. Baby!" Pinkie crowed, doing the happy hooves dance as the Simurgh fell apart in front of her, turning its core into a cupcake. Which Pinkie promptly ate. Blech! Cajun rubbed black forest ham and beef gravy cupcake..That's weird even for Me.

A dumbfounded Alexandria landed next to the wreckage of the Simurgh. "I, buh, wha...this is- I don't.. how?" she finally manged to ask.

Pinkie started sproinging. "OOH, ooh! I know! See when I was a filly I discovered an equation for a four dimensional receiver array and-" Pinkie stopped, remembering an important detail of this story. "Right. I forgot, my friend Twilight's head literally exploded when I tried to explain it to her. Um..." Pinkie paused to gather her thoughts. "I think Twilight would say something like: Theory abstract, my thoughts travel faster than light, so any psychic trying to read my mind will have theirs scrambled by the thought speed difference, while any precog trying to counter my actions will have their mind scrambled at my seeming ability to do two things at once, so I used that to "convince" Simmy here it was a great idea to turn itself into a cupcake. Which I ate."

Alexandria turned to the quickly deteriorating remains of the Simurgh, trying to come to terms with what she was seeing and what she'd just heard. She flinched a little when Pinkie started licking her face.

Pinkie suddenly gasped, going pink to blue to black to translucent back to pink.

"What the hell?" Alexandria muttered.

"IT ALL MAKES SENSE NOW!" Pinkie Pie shouted. "You! The Protectorate, Dr. Manton, Doctor Mother and the Case 53s! You're all going from world to world kidnapping people who are about to die and testing formulas on them and-" Alexandria, already on slippery mental footing, did the only thing she could think of: attack the pink thing.

Pinkie Sense going crazy, similarly to when Jack tries to kill me. Alexandria will go for the head, I duck low, take knee to the barrel (turning organs to mush), use Imovable Projection to mortally wound Alexandria, catch her torso with rear legs to spin myself around so I will be facing her back, use Time power to heal myself oh point 5 seconds after contact (mostly still airborne), use Faerie power to take her power, use Time power to put de-caped and deceased-ish Alexandria in sort-of-stasis, use off-screen teleport to get Riley here and back, have Riley fix Alexandria. Finally, use newly acquired Stasis power to find survivors and recently deceased and bring Riley to fix them as well using fire-portation. After that, plan and execute massive 'WE STOPPED AN ENDBRINGER' party using newly installed Multiple Launch Party System on the hill, and a usual 'I'M SORRY FOR KILLING YOU AND TAKING YOUR POWER but hey at least you're alive again and things are going to be okay, I PROMISE' party for when I take someone's cape power.

As it was thought, so it was done. There was a minor hiccup when the barrage of party rockets scared the crap out of everyone before they detonated in one of the largest parties the world had ever seen. Cat Scratch denies vehemently that he screamed like a little girl when they were incoming.

Many parties after the 'Simugh Insanity'

"I AM CRAWLER! FIGHT ME!" Crawler bellowed, charging Pinkie Pie.

"Hi Crawler, Why?" Pinkie asked, while Crawler flailed against Pinkie's Siberian power.

"Because I want to fight you!"

"Why?"

"Because I will kill everyone else here if you do not!"

"Why?"

"Because I want to fight you!"

"Why?"

-what felt like an eternity later. Jack, frustrated with both his inability to cut either Pinkie Pie or Crawler and the fruitless 'arguement' between the two, shouted "OH for god's sake, Pinkie! Crawler here get's stronger the more injuries he gets and is something of a masochist, so he goes around getting into cape fights."

"Oh! Well, why didn't you say so silly?" Pinkie dropped the Siberian power for a moment. YES! An Opening!

*Flash*

"Bullshit!" Jack shouts, "I saw that hit you, you pink abomination! You should be fucking dead!"

"Ah-hem!" With a sigh, Jack turns around to face...nothing. Confused, he looks around only to spot Pinkie Pie behind Crawler. "First of all" she says once Jack spots her. "my name is Pinkie Pie. Second, that was rude. Third, Mr. Crawler, do you enjoy getting hurt?"

"YES!" Crawler shouted.

"Really!?" Pinkie Pie looked excited at that revelation. "WELL then, let's throw down!"

Jack actually felt a little sick to his stomach. Sure Crawler hardly looked human when he showed up, but he was at least humanoid. Now, however...

*shudder*

"You cheated whelp!" Crawler shouted from..somewhere inside his decidedly spherical body.

"Did not! I just made it easier for you to feel pain! And with all that bone mass underneath your skin, you'll be able to take a beating-"

"He looks like an over-sized soccerball!" Cat Scratch shouted. He'd stopped trying to kill the pink thing...Pinkie Pie long before the fight was over.

"Exactly! He's got sensitive nerves on his skin and he's harder than quartz underneath! Now we can use him when we have Cape Kick Ball tournaments at the parties!"

-Many parties later

Cat Scratch stared at the 10 foot tall neon pink metal monstrosity Pinkie and some other guy were working on. "Honestly, I'm afraid to ask, after that MLRS halftrack you somehow kept hidden from everyone."

Pinkie just giggled.

Cat walked towards her, then stopped in his tracks. "Is that a bow on it's -uh- face?"

"Yup. It's the latest edition to my PartArmory! You like it? huh huh huh?" Pinkie asked, bouncing.

"Yeahhh." Cat drawlled. "I know I'm going to regret asking this, but, what does it do?"

"We~ll" Pinkie said as she suddenly appeared behind him. Honestly he didn't even flinch at her antics anymore. "Leet here had to help me with this one, actually. This baby is a fully autonomous, party spewing, masterpiece. The passive sensors detect ambient misery, and the AI directs it to find best place to throw a party without any external guidance, whatsoever. The main cannon can deliver a full on Pinkie Party through several feet of concrete several times a minute, though the alignment array needs to be stable -thus not moving- to do so, otherwise it might damage the concrete. It's secondary weapon can deliver a Party Petard's payload to a sad-ie sadderson several times a second even while moving, and the main sensor array can map out and deliver a 'we just stopped another Endbringer' level party barrage after a brief scan. I also had Lung proof the armor -oh he's with us now- and it took him a 15 minute build up to dent it. So, can just let it loose on the world without worrying about it getting destroyed! I call it the Sectopartayoid!"

-A few parties later

Taylor Awoke, sort of. As was usual for her, she didn't so much awaken as become aware of her surroundings.

And like usual, she, for lack of a better term, 'sensed' Scion notice her, and make a bee-line straight for her.

Well, here we go again, I guess.

~Meanwhile~

In the middle of another party Pinkie Pie stopped moving. Literally.

"Pinkie?" S3/Riley asked the hovering pony.

"It looks like Zion's making a move." Pinkie lowered herself to the ground, lost in thought. Super Sanguine Scalpel gave her a worried look. "That might work.." Pinkie muttered

After a second Pinkie snapped out of her reverie and flashed S3 a grin. "Oh, don't worry about me, go back to the party! I just need to take care of a few things." Pinkie reassured her little friend.

Well, tried to anyway, except she turned from a worried S3 to a terrified Riley. "B-b-but! You n-never leave parties!" she stammered, wide eyed.

Pinkie's eyes lit up in realization. "OH, it's..well I need to make preparations for the ULTIMATE Party. I thought I'd be able to get more done and send him his invitation later, but he's acting strange, so I need to get the preparations done sooner than later... I'll be back after an indeterminate amount of time."

"Wait, What?! I'm...I'm so confused Pinkie."

"But I'm always confusing..." Pinkie gave S3/Riley confused look. "Anyway, I need to get The Eye set up, then get his attention. Then... then comes the Ultimate Party. Sadly there won't be many I can invite to that one, but once The Eye of Parties is set up, I'll be able to play with you and every other parahuman in there with my Avatars!" she gave Riley a hug. "Now go have fun! This shouldn't take too long."

Pinkie wounded and stole the powers of Contessa, Doorman, and the Clairvoiant in less than a second and put the three as well as Dr. Mother in stasis less than a second after that.

"WHAT IS THE MEAN-ING OF THIS?!" Dr. Mother screamed in her time bubble.

"Zion's making a move towards unknown ends and I need these three powers and the ones from your Case 53s to get his attention, not to mention the power boost necessary to attain my Warp Goddess form." Pinkie replied matter-o-factly using Panacea's power to heal the people she hurt in the room. Foliage, it's not enough. I guess only Riley can get people 'working' after I take their powers. Should I drop them off to her, or bring her here? Xylem, neither option's a good one, but I need to get the Ultimate Party underway or all these people are lost... Sigh, sorry Riley. Pinkie thought as she opened a door to her.

Two quick fire-ports and one confused Riley later they were back in Cauldron's lair. "Sorry Riley, I thought I could handle this part on my own, but I need you to get these people better, and...well there's going to be a lot of them." Pinkie looked at the floor dejected.

"I'm even more lost than before..." She said. Pinkie withdrew a bit more, her poofy mane straightening out a bit. "but that's what friends are for right?"

Pinkie beamed and glomped Riley, her mane once more cotton candy like, before saying "Thank you!" As she began to move towards the greater complex her mane completely straightened as she turned to Dr Mother with one blood red eye. "Oh! Attempting to hold Riley hostage after those three get up is a really really bad idea." Her eyes returned to normal and she made her hair poofy once she was out of sight.

Dozens of Case 53s later, most of whom were glad to be rid of their powers and back to normal, Pinkie was finally able to access her subspace pocket. I think it's the power nullification and the power to lie to powers that let me get at it. She put on her Element of Laughter and ascended -from Alicorn straight through to Chaos Goddess of Parties and Merry Making- then found her Pink Lantern ring. Love this thing... She thought, slipping it on, giving herself a pink glow. Well, gotta say bye to Riley real quick. Then...It's SHOW TIME.

Taylor was once again staring at Scion. Oh god, the idiot's managed to make puppy eyes in to the weirdest/creepiest thing ever.

Suddenly, there was an anthro-pony peaking behind Scion. "Hi!" it -she going by voice- said.

"Um.. Hi?" Taylor replied hesitantly. Well, this is new. She then noticed Scion charging an attack in response to the newcomer. "NO! STOP! BAD!" Taylor screamed at Scion.

The golden git looked very confused, but stopped charging the attack.

"My name's Pinkie Pie! And, I must say I've never seen anyone like you before." Pinkie indicated Taylor.

"I'm Taylor, and...well, it's a long story."

"Liiiike super dooper looper long?"

Taylor's eyes lit at 'looper' "Yes, yes it is. And um... I mean people have called me an Anchor of support but... I'm frankly not so sure about that these days."

"I see... Well, I was going to just invite Zion here to the Ultimate party, but... I think you'd like it there, and dare I say...you need it too?"

"I'm not sure what the ultimate party is, but eh, it sounds fun and interesting, and judging by the look in your eye maybe a little terrifying, but...what the hell. I'm in."

[CONFUSION] Scion said, causing Pinkie's mane to be blown back.

"Wow." said the pony after clearing her ears and getting her mane back in order. "Tone it down a little big guy. Jeez."

"That's just how he talks."

"Ah, well...it'll take me a bit to compile my response, then."

After a few seconds, tho, Scion started looking impatient and irritated.

[PATIENCE] Pinkie told him, causing Scions hair to be blown back too.

After a tense few seconds, Pinkie spoke again [PEERLESS ENDLESS PARTY]

Scion seemed to mull it over for a split second, then [AGREEMENT]

"Great! Gimmie one second..." Pinkie pulled out a slip of paper. Stuck out her tongue in concentration then she began slicing the paper in a blur of motion until… suddenly there were two slips of paper, which she handed to Taylor and Scion.

"How'd you do that?" Taylor asked. She could see that both invitations were identical, and no powers that she could see were involved.

"Hehe, I can take the axiom of choice now!"

Taylor thought a minute then chuckled. "Kind of an advanced joke, don't you think?"

"Eh, I does what I dos, besides, I'm sure there are a few readers who'll get it."

"Readers?"

Pinkie waved her off then declared, "OK, let's get this started!"

Suddenly things went tesseract.

Edit: redacted

The gathered capes in the Eye of Parties were rather confused, but the atmosphere managed to put them at ease somewhat.

Well, except for Jack who was still fuming. "It's not fair."

"Of course not, I make the rules here." the avatar replied.

"Well, what do we do now then?"

"Whatever you want, though I do have some ideas..." She spun around with a flourish as a battlefield appeared behind a glass wall while nearby a bar came into being. "Ta-da!"

"What is this?" Lung demanded. "What has happened to my power? What have you done Witch!?" he shouted, pointing at the avatar. Which promptly ignored him

"GROUND RULES EVERYBODY!" the avatar shouted. "POWERS ARE DISABLED IN THE BAR, ANY INJURIES YOU GET IN THE BAR DO NOT TRANSFER TO THE BATTLEFIELD AND VICE VERSA." more and more capes were starting to pay attention. "NO MORE THAN FOUR TO A BATTLEFIELD. Yes, there are multiple battlefields. If you die in the bar you will have to wait five minutes before you can come back in; your killer will be kicked out of the bar and will be unable to enter any more battles for the rest of the night." the avatar then pointed to a large blackboard. "THERE'S THE SIGNUP SHEET, HAVE FUN!"

Pinkie managed to find Taylor in a quiet corner, looking contemplative while simultaneously looking at the Sight before her.

"Hiya!" Pinkie said. "What's gotcha down?"

"Hey, Pinkie...It's. Well.. this is fun, but I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop, or lament that at some point things are gonna go back to the way they were."

"Oh?"

"It's silly, but, I want to be Taylor again, and that Golden Bozo over there is going to keep making that impossible." She waved towards the Sight, but Pinkie never took her eyes off Taylor.

"Actually... I think... Any faerie -err shard- that comes either here or The Eye of Parties is getting 'purified' for given definitions of the word."

Taylor's head snapped to Pinkie.

"I'm not sure exactly what is going to happen after the loop ends, but the shards should be focused more on fun, or have fun as their ideal instead of conflict" Pinkie made a face at the last word.

"Wow, so..wow."

"If shards are programs, after this they'll have all the viruses, malware, porn etcetera removed." Taylor glomped Pinkie at that. Pinkie just smiled.

Taylor separated after a few minutes (she thinks anyway) and breathed. "I can't wait to-" then trailed off.

Pinke frowned. "What is it?"

Taylor sighed "Nothing." Pinkie gave Taylor a look. "Ok, fine, it's just that. I mean, don't get me wrong, that is fantastic news this has been an amazing century so far, but..." Taylor trailed off at the end.

"Buuuuut?"

*sigh* "I can't help thinking about my dad, I left without saying anything, and he never knew what happened to me, and the last he saw me- Hell last I saw him-"

"Taylor." Pinkie interupted. Once Taylor looked at the premier party pony, she continued "What do you notice about this place?"

"Umm... I mean the whole 4-D thing's pretty trippy, those other...Others I guess I'd call them are nice, but..."

"Time travels differently here." Pinky stated.

"What."

"Sorry, I'd have told you much sooner, but I thought you'd have caught on based on what you said when I made the Axiom of Choice comment."

"What."

"After we spend an eternity here, maybe two days will have passed on Earth Bet."

...

"It's sort of like how you can keep halving the distance between your hands, indefinitely, but you can still clap your hands… Are you mad at me?" Pinkie asked finally, fidgeting uncomfortably.

"Yes... a bit. and relieved, and embarrassed and hopeful and... God... I feel like.. I... Like my very long life flashed before my eyes."

Pinkie chuckled. "Sorry about that."

"It's.. well, I guess all is forgiven." Taylor felt a planet sized weight fall off her shoulders. I might be able to see my dad again. God it's been so long. But I'm sorta stuck here... Hell, when in Rome "So... this is your party. You presumably know what's fun to do here."

Pinkie shakes her head chuckling, catching a glimpse of the Sight which stopped her cold. "Has...wow, I left him here after the introductions back when we first came to the party... Has he been there the entire time?"

Taylor glances back to the Sight and nods. "Pretty much. He's...kinda got a one track mind."

"Explains why none of the Others wanted to talk to him though." Pinkie thought for a minute. "I was going to say we should go play a game, but this is really entertaining."

"I mean, I'm not surprised Scion didn't know which end of a mallet to hold, but it's something else to see it."

There was Scion attempting to play whack-a-dead planet and failing to hit anything while holding the mallet by its head.

"He's been playing for several years straight, and -OH LARCH! His score is still zero!" Pinkie laughed til she cried.

8.16 (NemiTheNen)

Taylor had a little ritual now every time she woke up, and had a moment to herself.

She wrote a letter to Ziz.

Scion didn't bother looking into the future very much. Simurgh always did, and Taylor always threw ripples about. Confusing her vision of the future, of what must be with a surreal and jarring jump.

She was fairly certain that Eidolon bastard daughter was the reason why Scion kept on flirting with her. Happy Scion means Humanity lives.

So Taylor wrote Ziz letters to get her to calm down and let her play.

This time though...Well, she couldn't get the time power to do what she wanted, she still didn't understand it yet-it was probably in someone elses' shard, but she didn't know where it was, if Scion or Eden even scattered it.

"Dear Ziz,

I know your vision just flipped out a while ago. Calm down.

If you help me I'll be Scion's girlfriend so he won't kill off humanity.

Anyways, I got a few weird powers that I need help figuring out. Come pick me and Tattletale up soon, okay?

No Love,

Queen Administrator"

8.17 (Mr Tebbs)

Taylor Awoke in a bathroom stall. Damnit, I hate this st-. Her thoughts were interrupted by several loud *whoosh* sounds followed by the door of the stall being ripped off and thrown against the wall, revealing a rather shocked Sophia.

"Woops! That wasn't supposed to happen." She said.

"Hey Sophia, thanks for that." I stopped to take stock of what I was seeing. "Um.. is there any particular reason you look like a naughty school girl with pig tails?"

"Well, I'm still kind of pissed at Jack for making me lose that bet. And, well, I just got back from a zombie Loop." she replied.

"Ok..."

Sophia then pulled out a chainsaw with a 10 foot decorated blade. "Are those...hearts?" I ask.

"Yep!"

"So.."

"I'm gonna cut off Jacks head, mount it to a Futurama style thing and go fuck up some Nilbog"

That got a laugh out of me.

"You wanna come with?" She asked.

I don't exactly have the figure for it, but I suppose Lollipop Chainsaw could be a fun change of pace... Eh, what the hell. "Sure, why not?"


End file.
